On this day 25 years ago

[chico20854]

April 20, 1998

Nothing in canon for the day.

The Wisconsin State Patrol returns to the area near Hatfield, Wisconsin in force, determined to reassert the state government's authority. A fierce firefight ensues, in which three troopers are killed and two captured by the Ho-Chunk tribe's militia (composed of well-armed veterans).

The scouts dispatched by X Corps in Alaska return, reporting that the Soviet defensive line through the pass in the Alaska Range is thinly supported, with little artillery or rear area installations. They report that there was minimal traffic to the Soviet forces, implying that they may be poorly supplied.

photo (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1xziIb5bXbDkJOgzP8Qrmy6WwREuUJ_xM/view?usp=share_link)
The British Army command staff, responding to the heavy losses suffered by BAOR in the 1997 campaign, surveys the military units and garrisons under its control for armored vehicles, even obsolescent ones, to send to Germany. The survey turns up contingents of Ferret armored cars, Saracen and Humber APCs and even two batteries worth of Abbot self-propelled howitzers, as well as small quantities of more modern armor from training detachments and research and testing facilities throughout England.

Third German Army orders the disbandment of remaining KDA (Kampfgruppen der Arbeiterklasse) East German paramilitary militia units in the former East Germany, returning the workers to the economy and turning their weapons over to the Army. Some of the most useful weapons freed up are the KDA's light anti-aircraft artillery; the KPV and DSHK heavy machineguns and 23mm and 37mm light anti-aircraft guns are brought forward to harden the increasing numbers of bunkers and fortifications along the Oder River.

As the reinforcement convoy headed to Africom rounds Cape Horn into the Indian Ocean, the nuclear-powered cruiser USS Virginia departs, its skipper deciding that, absent orders, it should remain in the Atlantic.

In the early morning hours, downtown Johannesburg is turned into a battle zone when armed AWB extremists attempt to take over government buildings. Mixed-race police units are nearly overrun and respond with live ammunition as well as tear gas, and within a few hours SADF troops are on the streets as well, reinforcing the police and hunting down bands of right-wing terrorists.

[chico20854]

April 21, 1998

Another day on which canon is silent. Unofficially.

At its new base in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, the 301st Port Security Unit is completely reorganized and absorbs a large number of personnel from other services, as well as police and federal agents. The reformed unit is flagged the 701st Maritime Rifle Regiment and is tasked as a waterborne military police formation.

Reflecting both the loss of industrial and military capability on the part of Frontal Aviation as well as the near-extinction of NATO interceptor coverage over the front line, a trio of Yak-52 light trainer aircraft, hastily modified with a pair of 57mm rocket pods, attack German positions north of Gorlitz on the Polish border.

The final survivor from the Barrikada, a scared 20-year-old steward from Perm in Siberia, wanders the pack ice of the Arctic. He does not know which direction he should be headed and escaped the polar bear attack without gloves or mittens.

The US Navy formally disbands the crew of the carrier USS America. The ship was abandoned and destroyed in Sicily following irreparable damage and the crew evacuated. After several weeks of indecision, they were brought to Germany to serve as replacements for depleted Army formations. Senior officers are assigned to corps- and army-level headquarters as additional watchstanders and technical experts assigned to 7th TAACOM to help maintain US Army Europe's battered equipment. Sailors that can't be used in their ratings are cycled through 7th Army Training Command's Basic Infantry Substitute Course (BISC), a four-week course to transform experienced servicemen (and women) into infantry replacements. (The training is a far cry from its pre-exchange conversion counterparts, since there is little ammunition, fuel or equipment to be spared for training use). The graduates, referred to as "Bisquicks", are welcomed to the depleted formations of III and V Corps in reserve positions behind the lines.

AWB extremists throughout South Africa rise up against the government in a (vain) attempt to halt the rollback of apartheid policies. Rail and road traffic is disrupted by blockades of heavily armed men (the AWB's right-wing beliefs also include that women should be passive and submissive) and government and military facilities, as well as airports and power stations, come under small arms fire.

[chico20854]

April 22, 1998

Nothing official for the day. Unofficially,

Graebarde reports that the harvest of the winter wheat crop, which had already been in the ground prior to TDM, fairs better than expected given the situation. Strenuous efforts are made to get the crop harvested. Fuels are made available for the transport of combines and trucks necessary to do the harvest, and the slow process begins in Texas. (The harvest will move north as the weather warms).

RainbowSix reports that GCHQ Bude, a satellite ground station on the north Cornwall coast operated by GCHQ, the British Signals Intelligence Service, is abandoned by the Government, with personnel relocating to Plymouth Naval Base together with what equipment they can carry.

Pleased with the prior day's successful sortie over German front lines along the Oder, the trio of Yak light trainers (operated by the 74th Guards Shturmovik Regiment), this time accompanied by a single Su-25, return to the skies over the Oder River. The mixed flight is greeted by a hail of anti-aircraft fire, but they press the attack on NATO troops (the 4th Battalion, 34th Armor, part of the US 8th Infantry Division). The driver of one of the American tanks (named "the Pink Cadillac"), SSG Kent Venters, on watch in the commander's position, scores a lucky shot with the vehicle's .50 caliber machinegun and the Su-25 goes down. The Yaks turn back after discharging their rockets in the general direction of the American positions, themselves scoring a lucky shot that destroys the Headquarters and Service Company's NBC LMTV truck.

Local Italian authorities in the northern part of the nation begin planning efforts to restore operations at the clusters of hydroelectric power plants along the southern slopes of the Alps.

The near civil war in South Africa continues. The SADF rallies its formations in garrisons throughout the nation and orders the 73rd Motorized Brigade back from the frontier facing Mozambique to supplement beleaguered police and local security troops. The first roadblocks leaving towns outside garrisons are removed by the application of firepower, in some cases augmented by strikes from the SADF's fighter-bombers and armed helicopters.

[chico20854]

April 23, 1998

Nathan Snyder, a 31-year old corporal in the 42nd Infantry Division (New York National Guard) on internal security duties in Manhattan, deserts from his unit, taking his M16 rifle and ammunition with him.

Unofficially,

In Alaska, X Corps organizes another effort to leapfrog over Soviet resistance. Once again, the plan calls for the 2nd Battalion, 511th Infantry to be parachuted behind the enemy lines from from the bush planes of the 2nd Battalion, 207th Aviation Regiment, where they will link up with scouts and other light forces infiltrated around the Soviet positions.

In British Columbia, the last of the Canadian Army forces resisting the 76th (my 71st) Tank Division's assault on Victoria Island is withdraw by small craft, leaving small detachments behind to report on enemy activity in the occupied territory.

Despite the loss of a Su-25 in the prior day's operations, the 74th Guards Shturmovik Regiment dispatches more Yak-52 armed light trainers across the Oder. This time they are intercepted by a F-16A from the 313th Tactical Fighter Squadron, which has a difficult time attacking the low- and slow-flying aircraft with the fighter's guns. After several minutes of weaving and circling, one of the trainers is shot down and the remaining pair split up, running for the relative safety of friendly lines and their haven at the Drawsko Pomorskie Airbase in northwestern Poland. That base is visited after dark by a flight of four F-16s from the 50th Tactical Fighter Wing, which catches the defending gunners unaware. With a single pass the American fighters dispense eight CBU-58 and eight CBU-71 cluster bombs on the Polish airfield, which blanket the Polish airfield with almost 10,000 bomblets. (One of the units fails to open and only breaks apart on impact with the ground 300 feet below). Half of the bomblets explode on impact, while the others detonate randomly in the minutes, hours and days that follow. The runway receives only superficial damage, but the Yak trainers, Su-25 attack aircraft and ground installations and vehicles (all in individual revetments scattered around the air vase and its perimeter, ironically built by USAF engineers in 1997) are all peppered by bomblet fragments. One of the Yaks survive, as do three of the regiment's remaining Su-25s.

The last survivor of the Barrikada mutiny succumbs to the elements.

The JSA issues orders on the organization of its subordinate units. Given the rough terrain and poor communications, the JSA leadership orders a simple initial plan of operations: formations are to descend from the high country into one of the valleys of each of the major tributaries of the Sava River and sweep downstream, engaging any Pact, Italian or puppet troops they encounter and linking up with other JSA formations, preserving as much of the supplies, industry and other infrastructure of the valleys as possible.

[chico20854]

April 24, 1998

The town of Titusville, Pennsylvania is flooded with refugees seeking the relative safety and security of western New York.

In west-central Alaska, the 6th (my 99th) Guards Air Assault Division finds itself cut off on the Seward Peninsula by the X Corps counterattack to its south.

Unofficially,

The Sturgeon-class nuclear attack submarine USS Pargo arrives in Pearl Harbor at the conclusion of a long patrol that took it in search of Soviet naval and merchant shipping throughout the western Pacific.

After a quiet and restful winter supported by the fruits of successful raids on Allied supply dumps in the fall, the deserters of 5th Squad resume their activity in the wooded region of northwestern East Germany. Their first ravaging of the year is a group of German civilian refugees traveling on foot from the coast inland in search of suitable land to farm.

RainbowSix reports that, with BAOR in dire need of reinforcement, the 5th Division embarks on the Princess of Scandinavia and a number of smaller ships and sails from South Shields for Bremerhaven, in what will be the last major British reinforcement of the war. Following their departure, responsibility for local security passes to a number of Territorial battalions based in the area.

In South Africa, Army troops have been able to restore movement along the rail lines and major highways between the major cities - Durban, Capetown, Johannesburg and Praetoria, while riot police have restored order to the city centers. Many rural areas and back roads remain impassible, however, due to AWB roadblocks, and many citizens of smaller towns and cities remain afraid to leave their homes. The South African Air Force deploys its aircraft in reconnaissance sorties, looking for terrorist roadblocks.

[chico20854]

April 25, 1998

In light of the dire condition of BAOR, 19 Infantry Brigade in the UK is relieved of disaster relief and internal security duties in England and ordered to prepare for deployment to the Continent.

Unofficially,

An emissary from the Acting Governor of Wisconsin arrives at the border of the Ho-Chunk nation under a white flag. He desires to discuss the return of the captured state troopers.

The commander of 2nd Battalion, 511th Infantry reports his command ready for its airborne assault on the Soviet rear area south of the Alaska Range. The infiltration of scouts from the 2nd Infantry Brigade (Arctic Recon) is still ongoing, however, so the date of the assault is postponed until they are in position. To tie down the Soviet defenders (the 110th Guards Motor-Rifle Division), X Corps permits some of its remaining mortar ammunition to be expended in harassment fires. (X Corps fired the last of its howitzer ammunition in February during the Battle of Fairbanks).

Frontal Aviation ground crewmen at the bomb-scarred Drawsko Pomorskie Airbase in Poland are able to clear the runway, taxiway and other paved areas of the base of undetonated cluster bomblets using the water cannon on a fire truck requisitioned from the Polish city of Bydgoszcz. Two men are killed, however, when a time-delayed bomblet located in a grassy area detonates, and time-delayed bomblets force the base to remain largely locked down as the Soviets hope the last of the timers have run down.

The convoy to AFRICOM is forced to reduce speed to a paltry 8 knots in order to reduce fuel consumption. While the move all but assures there will be sufficient fuel to reach port in Kenya, the flotilla's supply officers are concerned about the dwindling food supplies aboard the ships, especially those packed with troops. Marines are ordered to redouble their fishing efforts from the ships' decks, which, while bringing in precious protein, is insufficient to feed the thousands of troops and sailors.

[chico20854]

April 26, 1998

After hiding in an abandoned building in New York City and dodging patrols of his erstwhile compatriots, deserter Nathan Snyder joins up with an Upper East Side marauder gang called Hell's Own.

Of prewar population of Silesia of 3m, less than 100,000 survive, felled by bombings, invasion, nuclear strikes, famine and plague.

Kenyan and American forces drive the last organized Tanzanian units back to the border, forcing them back to their start lines.

Unofficially,

X Corps in Alaska is awaiting confirmation that the remaining infiltrators from the 2nd Infantry Brigade (Arctic Recon) have crossed the Alaska Range and are overlooking the 110th Guards Motor-Rifle Division's supply lines.

Soviet troops approach the Yukon-British Columbia border after linking up with friendly forces (the 22nd Motor-Rifle Division) that have crossed the coastal mountains from Skagway, Alaska.

In Lithuania, Party officials, rebuffed by the commander of the 1st Byelorussian Front, dispatch an emissary to the commander of the Reserve Front to beg for the removal of the renegade Colonel Skrebys from Trakai Castle.

[chico20854]

April 27, 1998

Nothing official for today. Unofficially,

After two days of talks, the representative of the Wisconsin state government and the chief of the Ho-Chunk Nation, Henry Red Cloud, agree to release the two captured state troopers (less their weapons and equipment) and the bodies of the three killed in exchange for recognition of the tribe's sovereignty and an agreement to not interfere in the tribe's territory.

In Alaska, the scouts from the 2nd Infantry Brigade (Arctic Recon) are in place near the lone road supplying the 110th Guards Motor-Rifle Division but the weather is too bad for the bush planes available to X Corps to locate the drop zones. (The requisitioned civilian aircraft are largely reliant on visual navigation, lacking military navigational equipment).

The 81st Tactical Fighter Wing, an A-10 Warthog unit that fought throughout the 1996 and 1997 campaigns in Central Europe, launches its first sorties in many months from its new station of Neubrandenburg, (former East) Germany. The wing (down to eight operable aircraft) launches two aircraft to attack suspected Polish Army artillery positions identified by US Marines southeast of Szczecin.

The USS Virginia, operating independently in the South Atlantic, encounters the Soviet trawler "Star of Crimea" fishing some 375 miles southwest of Capetown, South Africa. A short chase results in the capture of the Soviet craft (the crew being wise enough not to scuttle the ship, knowing how slim their chances of survival in this remote patch of ocean are). The crew are taken prisoner, the trawler's catch of frozen fish transferred to the cruiser's depleted freezers and the ship's officers interrogated, its logs examined, communications gear seized and ship's conditions examined by US navy engineers. The logs are encoded and the trawler's crypto gear was destroyed before the boarding party arrived, but the crew confirms that there is a largely idle fishing flotilla extant in the southern Atlantic, providing support to Soviet Navy raiders and submarines. The engineering crew notes that the trawler has been burning fish oil and that two of its fish meal tanks are carrying oil instead; they speculate that the fishing fleet is relying on the catch to provide oil to keep the ships operating. The Virginia takes the fish oil aboard to run its emergency generators if needed, then the boarding party opens the seacocks and sends the trawler to the bottom.

David Hudson, a CIA agent who has been operating undercover in the outskirts of Moscow (reporting on scientific developments in the many research institutes and high-tech production centers) since he was infiltrated in during 1996, requests permission to evacuate. He reports to his supervisor (operating from Camp Peary, Virginia) that he has been evacuated to a collective farm northeast of Moscow and that following the nuclear attacks on Moscow he has been unable to re-establish contact with any sources and he doubts that the research institutes are operating. His handler agrees that the information Hudson can gather is unlikely to be of sufficient value to justify his continued presence and authorizes him to evacuate to friendly territory as he best sees fit.

In Australia, the Ned Kelly gang launches another raid, this one on a remote farm near the town of Goombargana in southern New South Wales. They make off with several cattle, a generator and two farm trucks loaded with feed and fuel. The station manager calls for help from the Main Force Patrol, but the police force is currently engaged in an extended struggle to capture a motorcycle gang leader known as "The Night Rider".

[chico20854]

April 28, 1998

Ammunition stocks in Kenya have been run down significantly in the fighting and further operations must wait until a second convoy arrives from the US. As a result of the ammunition shortage and the flooding the Somali and Sudanese invaders still retain a small foothold in northern Kenya.

Stuart Harris, leader of a gang of armed Scottish raiders, forms an alliance with two other armed gangs that are operating nearby, with the intention of controlling the Scottish countryside. He calls the group the Tartan Army and calls for other groups to join his alliance.

Unofficially,

Conditions over X Corps' front lines between Fairbanks and Anchorage remain overcast, delaying the airborne assault for another day.

A detachment of the Soviet 22nd Guards Motor-Rifle Division reaches the Yukon-British Columbia border.

A 5th Squad scouting group encounters another group of heavily armed men wandering the NATO rear area, these a motley group of German Army deserters and wayward stragglers, and a firefight breaks out. Three 5th Squad men are killed as are four Germans.

The first contingent of Italian engineers, escorted by a Carabinieri detachment, departs Turin to evaluate conditions at the Campore Basso hydropower plant.

In the early morning hours CIA agent David Hudson slips away from his shared bunk in the tractor barn ion a collective farm northeast of Moscow, bringing his radio, a supply of food and a Stenchin machinepistol with him.

[chico20854]

April 29, 1998

The 46th Infantry Division (Texas, New York and Puerto Rico National Guard) is ordered to move from Virginia, where it has been performing internal security and disaster relief duties since November, to Texas by road, where it will disperse throughout the eastern part of the state on anti-riot duties.

Unofficially,

The division is filled out with additional troops - sailors from the Hampton Roads area without ships or squadrons, airmen from Langley Air Force Base and freshly trained recruits from the training battalions at Forts Lee and Eustis (including an entire platoon of parachute riggers that have completed their training at Fort Lee but are unable to obtain transport to XVIII Airborne Corps in Iran). To conserve fuel and in recognition of its mission in Texas, it leaves nearly all of its remaining heavy weapons and armored vehicles behind. This move is a recognition of the significant military forces available in the Hampton Roads region from the cluster of bases there (the Army's Forts Eustis, Story and Monroe, Langley Air Force Base and the Norfolk Naval station complex, its ranks swelled by the crews of ships stuck in port and aircraft grounded for lack of fuel). It is also a reflection of the need for additional troops to secure the remaining petroleum production infrastructure of the Texas Gulf Coast.

The weather in Alaska remains snowy, windy and cloudy, delaying again the 2nd Battalion, 511th Infantry Regiment's parachute drop behind Soviet lines.

The commander of the 2nd Southwestern Front reaches out to his KGB counterparts in preparation for the release of tactical nuclear weapons in the upcoming offensive. The KGB officer demurs, citing a lack of orders from Moscow. The Army commander suspects the real reason is the KGB detachments' comfortable occupation of former Austrian and German garrisons, including Luftwaffe and US Army bases in southern Germany with highly secure nuclear weapons storage facilities; even with the electronic alarms and other sophisticated defenses disabled they provide admirable security and, more importantly to the KGB troops, more comfortable surroundings than any comparable base in the Warsaw Pact.

In eastern Siberia, the Hungarian 53rd Mechanized Brigade has reached the blockage in the Trans-Siberian Railroad caused by an American nuclear strike which obliterated the junction of the Trans-Siberian with the Baikal-Amur Mainline, the other railroad that crosses Siberia to the Pacific. The Hungarian rear guard reports sightings of the 27th (my 90th) Tank Division's advanced patrols as that unit continues its journey to the Western Front.

[chico20854]

April 30, 1998

The American counteroffensive in Alaska has severed the Soviet's main supply route across the Bering Strait. The Soviet units are forced to live off the land and many have to break up to survive.

The first major outbreak of bubonic plague occurs in San Francisco.

In Cameroon, the Limbe oil refinery is forced to shut down when the facility's reboiler fails due to fatigue. It is the nation's sole source of refined petroleum following the collapse of seaborne imports.

Unofficially,

At a "Cabinet" meeting (nearly all of the pre-war Cabinet is dead, and nearly every department is represented by some junior official acting far above their pay grade and expertise) President Munson is presented with a report on the status of the American economy at the end of the first quarter of the year. It is impossible to even semi-accurately enumerate the state of the economy, with entire sectors (finance and insurance, most manufacturing, energy and mining) almost entirely shut down and millions not only unemployed but dead from Soviet nuclear strikes, famine, disease or civil unrest. The sliver of good news is that there are islands of stability and order from which modest reconstruction efforts are starting, and, the (Acting) CIA Director gleefully reports, conditions in the USSR are, by all reports, much worse, indicating that it is appearing increasingly as if the US has prevailed in the nuclear war. Munson, reeling from news of the horror he has just received, flies into a rage and has to be physically restrained from attacking the CIA man.

In an unusual occurrence, a F-15 of the 1st Tactical Fighter Wing is intercepted by a Soviet fighter, a MiG-23 of the 841st Guards Fighter Regiment, over the front lines south of Dezful. The American aircraft has only three missiles aboard and the Soviet one has two, and a short engagement results in the loss of the Soviet bird.

CIA agent David Hudson has covered nearly 50 km on foot since escaping the collective farm northeast of Moscow three nights ago, but has come to the realization that there is no way he will escape the USSR at such a pace. On the other hand, an exfiltration by the CIA clearly isn't going to occur, so he needs to find another way to escape the massive enemy nation.

[chico20854]

May 1, 1998

Nothing official for the day. Unofficially,

California authorities order the immediate quarantine of San Francisco to prevent the spread of bubonic plague. Unfortunately, issuing the orders is the easiest step to take; the State Guard is more than fully engaged just trying to keep food distribution going (and the exhausted guardsmen are less than enthusiastic about travelling into the quarantine zone and interacting with people in rat-infested warehouses), and the federal government has no meaningful assistance to lend.

The weather over X Corps' front lines in Alaska finally clears enough for 120 paratroops of the 10th Mountain (my 11th Airborne) Division to drop behind Soviet lines in the hamlet of McKinley Village, blocking their supply route in coordination with scattered patrols of the 2nd Infantry Brigade (Arctic Recon), which are blocking minor routes and other potential travel routes.

Map of front lines (https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1AIWNl705p_BnRYi1V4CgwKEgK3IowOhg&usp=sharing)
In Europe, the warring armies are ready to resume active hostilities. Higher commanders have regained contact with most remaining subordinate units and the long, cold winter has given units time to rest and restructure. While supplies of food and fuel were depleted over the winter, ammunition stocks have not been used and the long quiet period gave unit maintainers time to sort through remaining spare part inventories and identify vehicles for cannibalization, restoring some vehicles to full operational status. Many formations have disbanded understrength units to bring others up to closer to full strength, resulting in brigades with two battalions or companies short of a platoon but otherwise at 75 percent of “book” strength. Additional reinforcements have been sent to front-line units after rear area support units were culled for surplus soldiers and excess air force and shoreside naval personnel were reassigned to army units.

For the first time since 1917, there is no parade through Red Square in Moscow, which is much too irradiated for most surviving Soviet citizens to dare enter.

[chico20854]

May 2, 1998

A New America expedition to ruins of Blytheville Air Force Base stumbles across an army unit busily excavating a cache of undamaged cruise missiles from a rubble-buried storage bunker. The New American commander, showing more initiative than sense, attacks the unit. His unit suffers 60% casualties, but a truck convoy with five ALCMs already loaded on board is overrun and captured. The army unit suffers light casualties and attributes the attack to marauders.


Unofficially,

The American airborne force in Alaska comes under Soviet attack as the 110th Guards Motor Rifle Division dispatches a detachment from the 558th Guards Motor-Rifle Regiment to dislodge the blocking force. To the south, the combined force of the 22nd Guards Motor-Rifle Division and the 99th Guards Air Assault Division move south into British Columbia, sending scavenging parties far and wide to secure food and fuel to sustain the attacking force.

In the skies over Czechoslovakia, two RF-16Cs of the 26th Tactical Reconnaissance Wing collide while swerving and weaving to throw off a pursuing MiG-29 of the Czech 8th Fighter Regiment. The pilots had only flown three missions in the prior two months, none of which had included flying with a wingman. The loss of the two precious fighters shows how rapidly proficiency of fighter pilots deteriorates when pilot skills are not used.

The American freighter Gulf Shipper is attacked by pirates in small boats off the Horn of Africa while on a voyage to secure food supplies for the Iranian civilian population.

Another car bomb tears apart the downtown of a South African city, this time the provincial capital of Bloemfontein. Authorities strongly suspect that it is the work of AWB terrorists, whose compatriots still control vast swathes of the countryside despite a massive active counterinsurgency by SADF forces.

[chico20854]

May 3, 1998

Nothing in canon for the day. Unofficially,

To conserve fuel, the 347th Strategic Missile Squadron halts patrols of its 21 MGM-134 Midgetman ICBM Hard Mobile Launchers, instead stationing each at a dispersal site within 10 miles of the squadron headquarters at Desert Rock airfield, Nevada.

The 110th Guards Motor-Rifle Division thrashes against the small American blocking force, pushing the paratroops off the main (and only paved) road while other division elements attempt to withdraw from the front lines under pressure from other elements of X Corps.

As part of an effort to strip precious resources from NATO troops in southern Germany, the Soviet Baltic Front launches a series of attacks on II MEF and the Danish Jutland Mechanized Division in northwestern Poland. The attacks are a welcome to the British 3rd Commando Brigade (reinforced with the Dutch 9th Amphibious Combat Group), which has just arrived in Germany after extensive service in northern Norway.

The nuclear cruiser USS Virginia turns southwest in the South Atlantic, heading for the remote Gough Island and the sealanes between there and Tristan da Cunha, seeking the Soviet fishing fleet.

South African Buccaneer light bombers attack an isolated farm 120 km northwest of Bloemfontien, which informants within the AWB have indicated is the regional headquarters for the right-wing terrorist group. Delivering a distinct message, the farm is incinerated by the napalm canisters dispensed by the low-flying aircraft.

[chico20854]

May 4, 1998

Nothing in canon for the day. Unofficially,

The first case of bubonic plague is reported in Sacramento, 85 miles from San Francisco, despite the (ineffective) quarantine of the latter city.

In Mexico, the governing El Partido Accion Nacional (PAN) party is failing to alleviate the challenges of life in 1998 (as is every government in the world at this time), and the military-supported Partido Autentico de la Revolucion Mexicano (PARM) makes a move in the Chamber of Deputies to have the caretaker government (the PAN lacks a majority and elections are scheduled for June) replaced. The PARM backs up this demand with a demonstration of force by the Presidential Guard Brigade.

RainbowSix reports that Parliament reconvenes for the first time since Black Thursday as a number of surviving MP’s and Peers meet in the cathedral city of Winchester in Hampshire. (They meet in the city's Guildhall). With Douglas Montgomery confirmed as Prime Minister. Parliament’s first act is to pass a continuation of the Emergency Powers Act, with the military retaining primacy for law and order. Most of the surviving members of the British and Dutch Royal Families move to the Winchester area at this time, taking up residence in several country houses just outside the city, although those in the immediate line of succession to both Thrones (Prince Harry for the British and Prince Willem Alexander of Orange for the Dutch) are moved to secret locations in secure areas controlled by the military (rumours persist for some time afterwards that they have gone overseas, to either Australia or New Zealand).

Baltic Front continues its assault on II MEF's front lines. The 5th Marine Division's 27th Regimental Combat Team is brought forward from reserve positions in the town of Goleniów, and overhead F/A-18s and Harriers of Marine Aircraft Group 14 are called in (in small numbers) to reinforce outposts that are at risk of being overrun.

[chico20854]

May 5, 1998

Nothing in canon for the day. Unofficially,

The trailing elements of the 110th Guards Motor-Rifle Division descend to the southern slopes of the Alaska Range, under pressure from troops of the 10th Mountain (my 11th Airborne) Division, marking the successful eviction of Soviet troops from their strongest defensive line between Fairbanks and Anchorage.

Order in much of central and eastern England deteriorates with the withdrawal of 5th Division and 19 Infantry Brigade from civil relief duties for deployment to the continent.

The last US Pacific Fleet nuclear missile submarine, the USS Georgia, returns to port at Port Hadlock, Washington, joining ten other Trident boats in Hawaii and the Pacific Northwest.

The heavy equipment of the 46th Infanty Division (roughly one armored, one mechanized infantry and four truck-borne infantry battalions, plus two and a half battalions worth of artillery and other divisional combat support and service supportunits) departs Norfolk, Virginia aboard the American freighters Cape Turner and Baltimore Freedom and the (captured Greek and reflagged Panamanian) Manley Falmouth.

AWB terrorists continue to control wide swathes of the South African countryside; the SADF makes the drastic decision to incorporate former ANC (African National Congress) guerillas into regular units.

[chico20854]

May 6, 1998

Canon has nothing for the day. Unofficially,

The students of the 10th California Cadet Brigade and the garrison of the Naval Weapons Station Seal Beach, on the southern edge of the Los Angeles urban buildup, have succeeded in planting nearly all of the 5250-acre (21 sq-km) complex. They hope that the crops, shellfish harvested from the extensive marshes and fish caught from shore and the few small boats available will be sufficient to sustain themselves. (Military authorities have stopped sending troops into the devastated Los Angeles area following the extensive nuclear strikes on refineries in December).

In Alaska, once again X Corps troops are too short of supplies to offer a close pursuit of the Soviets that they have driven out of defensive positions; what little spare food and fuel available is dedicated to relief of the airborne and scout troops that had blocked the Soviet supply lines.

The Soviet Sierra-III class sub K-231, which has been on patrol non-stop since escaping the Mediterranean in late August, is running low on provisions. The captain's orders authorize him to seek shelter in Luanda, Angola as well as giving him code information to contact a number of supply vessels lurking in remote anchorages around the world. Luanda was struck by South African nuclear weapons in December, forcing the skipper to broadcast signals to try to locate a supply ship.

In Afghanistan, the isolated Soviet garrison in Khandahar (built around the 70th Guards Motorized Rifle Brigade) finds itself in an increasingly difficult situation. It has been nearly four months since the last resupply flight arrived and over 18 months since the last ground convoy. The only reason the command has not been wiped out is that the unit provides the only protection for the townspeople against the bands of deserters (from the Red Army and the puppet Afghan DRA), bandits and mujahidin that roam the countryside. The garrison commander provides protection for the poppy farms in the region, receiving the supply of food and fuel his command needs and that can only be supplied by drug runners in this chaotic environment.

The Hungarians of the 53rd Mechanized Brigade are forced to once again abandon the trains that have transported them from China after several days of seeking a way to repair or bypass the damaged portion of the Trans-Siberian railroad in eastern Siberia. They load their vehicles with as much fuel as they can carry and light the abandoned train they are leaving behind afire.

The convoy to Kenya is ordered to hold in place as an Allied naval force is hastily assembled to deal with the Soviet naval task force that has been sighted by a rare S-3 Viking patrol flight.

[chico20854]

May 7, 1998

Another day with nothing in canon. Unofficially,

The Acting Director of the CIA, his pride wounded by the dressing-down he received from President Munson following the assessment that the US has prevailed in the nuclear exchange, begins plotting revenge.

As word of the establishment of the Ho-Chunk territory spreads, Native Americans from throughout the upper Midwest begin to travel to the territory.

In Alaska, the 1st Infantry Brigade (Arctic Recon) dispatches a company (B Company, 2nd Battalion, 297th Infantry) down the still frozen Yukon River to secure the river's mouth, firmly denying use of the river as a transport route to the Soviets, who still have a sizeable portion of the 6th (my 99th) Guards Air Assault Division isolated to the north.

The cruiser USS Virginia, patrolling remote areas of the South Atlantic, as well as the NSA intercept station on Ascension Island and South African naval intelligence center at Silvermine near Capetown, intercept the K-231's transmissions and the response it receives from the Soviet fishing flotilla in the South Atlantic. Coordination between the three stations, however, takes some time, but the American cruiser has turned to advance down the bearing of the submarine's transmission while the South Africans dispatch a Boeing 707 tanker/ELINT aircraft of 60 Squadron SAAF to the area as well. Unbeknownst to the Americans and their South African comrades in arms (the American government, such as it is, is still working on the diplomatic niceties of formalizing the relationship as an alliance), the K-231 has returned to depth and is moving slowly towards the Soviet fishing fleet, which is remaining nearly stationary to preserve fuel and simplify the rendezvous with the sub.

A hastily assembled task force of American and Kenyan surface combatants sorties from Mombasa to cut off the Soviet Indian Ocean Squadron before it can intercept the AFRICOM supply convoy, which is off Durban, South Africa. The South African Navy dispatches a task force as well, which rushes past the slowly-moving convoy.

In the Caribbean, French forces eliminate the last holdout positions of the Dutch 3rd Amphibious Combat Group and their local militia augmentees on St. Maarten. The Dutch, out of touch with home for months, have been resisting the French invasion since January.

[chico20854]

May 8, 1998

The remaining Soviet naval forces in the Indian Ocean that had survived the nuclear strikes on Maputo and the Seychelles are destroyed by the combined efforts of the US, Kenyan and South African Navies.

Unofficially,

RainbowSix reports that James (Lord Seymour of Marston), decorated Korean War hero and former Defense Minister and Foreign Secretary and an old friend of PM Douglas Montgomery, is visited at his home, where the PM asks him to return to Government service and take up the role of Foreign Secretary. Seymour agrees at once, joining the Government at Winchester.

Soviet forces along the Oder River line launch fierce artillery and mortar barrages, commencing after sunset. One of the units, the 20th (my 16th Guards) Tank Division adds its tanks' gunfire to the barrage, using inclined earthen ramps to add to their guns' elevation.

American and South African naval commands covering the South Atlantic coordinate as well, fixing the location from which the K-231 broadcast as well as the responding station. The overflight of the former location by a South African Boeing 707 reports nothing on the surface or vicinity, and the aircraft continues to the second location. Upon arrival in the vicinity of the fishing fleet, the South African aircraft is expectantly engaged by a SA-N-7 missile, which shoots it down, although not before it is able to relay the fleet's location to shore. The American cruiser is dispatched to the location, and thanks to its nuclear propulsion, it is able to travel at over 30 knots towards the Soviet fleet.

[chico20854]

May 9, 1998

Nothing official for the day. Unofficially,

In the first of several "dirty tricks" inflicted on President Munson, power is cut to his personal quarters by an unexplained electrical fault.

The Nebraska corn and alfalfa crops begin to be planted, using carefully husbanded seed and fuel. Grae adds that there is not enough hybrid seed, and much of it never gets out of the seed warehouses. In many areas fuel is too scarce for use to cultivate and herbicide and pesticide chemicals are used sparingly as farmers realize there probably will not be more forthcoming; in the end there is not enough commercial fertilizer for all the new crop. What fertilizer and herbicide there is is allocated to the highest yielding fields and crops. In the western part of the state irrigation has ceased with the cutoff of electrical power, leaving much of the land to revert to rangeland. Likewise, irrigation-supported agriculture collapses in much of California and the desert southwest, except in areas that have transitioned to specialized (or long-forgotten) dry agricultural techniques. All around the nation, the spring planting is nearly entirely dedicated to food, with less than 5 percent of the 1997 acreage of cotton planted.

Fulfilling the Soviet command's decree that the offensive be launched on the anniversary of Germany’s surrender in the Second World War, Soviet troops of the 16th and 41st Armies launch a coordinated attack northwest of Munich, preceded by a brief but intense barrage that mixes smoke and chemical artillery shells, effectively neutralizing the thinly spread line of outposts in front of the main defensive line. In most cases the defenders are not able to raise the alarm, as the chemicals overcome them when their expired gas mask filters and chemical defense suits fail. Soviet motor-riflemen have infiltrated between and even behind the well dispersed defensive positions, isolating them from reinforcement. The Soviet offensive is intended to seize the remaining industrial sites and power stations of central Germany.

The American cruiser USS Virginia continues to steam southwest at flank speed, closing on the location of the Soviet fishing flotilla in the South Atlantic. Ashore, the South African Air Force readies its Canberra and Buccaneer strike fleets for an attack on the Soviets, while liaison officers coordinate for an overflight by American B-52 bombers from Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, who are going to conduct a separate strike on the Soviets.

North of Moscow CIA Agent David Hudson stumbles on a remote dacha (country house) occupied by a minor party official from Moscow and his family, who had fled to the retreat to avoid the (easily foreseen) destruction of Moscow. Desperate for a quicker way out of the Soviet Union, he takes the official's wife hostage at gunpoint when she is outside tending the garden and forces the family to stock the family car, a Lada sedan, with food, blankets and all the fuel (both gasoline and homemade vodka) it can hold. He then races off to the west.

The Norwegian sail training ship Statsraad Lehmkuh departs Montevideo, Uruguay with a cargo of food for its home city aboard.

[chico20854]

May 10, 1998

The replica USS Constitution calls on Lisbon, discharging a cargo of electronic parts.

Unofficially,

In southern Ohio, the Hells Angels motorcycle gang launches a mirror operation to the one their West Coast brethren pulled in January, attacking the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility, a maximum-security prison, from both the inside and outside. The under-supplied and inadequate guard force fights valiantly, but after nearly nine hours of running combat inside and outside the secure area the last of the corrections officers surrender. Despite orders from the gang's leadership the guards are executed by the inmates, and soon a second bloodletting commences as the bikers purge the inmate population of those that may prove problematic in the future.

Colonel Oleg Tumanski's Spetsnaz team in western England emerges from its winter hibernation, with new orders from GRU Moscow Center. While last year's operations were largely focused on pinprick attacks on critical points to hinder the British war effort, the team is now tasked with gathering strategic intelligence about conditions within the UK. This information will hopefully enable Soviet command to assess the likely level of British contribution to the war as well as provide post-strike damage assessment to permit planners to retarget surviving nuclear weapons should the nuclear exchange resume.

In many areas of southern Germany Pact forces have overrun the NATO outpost line and closed on the main line of resistance. The Italian 4th Army Corps, which was not informed of the offensive by Soviet commanders (who were concerned about disloyal Italian officers who may harbor pro-NATO sympathies leaking word of the offensive), hurriedly scrambles to reposition itself into an offensive posture.

The skies above the battlefront are suddenly relatively crowded with aircraft. While theatre-wide daily sortie counts in April averaged approximately a dozen by NATO and six by the Pact there are over 60 NATO fighter-bombers and interceptors airborne while Frontal Aviation and the Czechoslovakian Air Force get nearly 100 flights aloft. Some minor dogfighting occurs, with the loss of three MiGs and a Luftwaffe F-4 Phantom, but the emphasis of the operations are on support of ground troops.

CIA Agent David Hudson, driving a stolen Lada sedan, takes back and side roads in his evacuation from the USSR. He skirts the towns of Kalinin (the Tsarist Tver) and Novgorod, bluffing his way past the occasional MVD or local militia roadblock. (The stash of food and vodka comes in handy for this, as well as a small stash of gold coins provided long ago by the CIA).

[chico20854]

May 11, 1998

Nothing official for the day. Unofficially,

Another dirty trick is played on President Munson, when the canteen manager reports that the supplies of fresh food have run out and that there are only canned baked beans and tuna to feed the staff of the Presidential Bunker. Munson, who has developed a sensitive stomach as a result of the stress of his near-impossible job, spends much of the day unable to function.

Mexico City is wracked by unrest as Army units supporting the PARM party clash with shadow paramilitary groups loyal to the PAN caretaker government or the PRI party, the traditional ruling party of the nation. Rumors swirl that the anti-Army militias contain military deserters, policemen and enforcers from the many narcotics cartels.

5th Squad, operating in northwestern former East Germany, accepts its first non-American recruit, a Canadian Army deserter from the outskirts of Toronto. He is subjected to a beating as an initiation ritual into the gang.

In southern Germany, Italian troops join Hungarians, Czechs and Soviets in attacks all along the NATO main line of resistance, probing for weak spots and trying to run down their opponent's carefully husbanded supplies. Behind the NATO lines, commanders attempt to rush replacements and supplies to the front.

A naval battle erupts in the South Atlantic when the nuclear guided missile cruiser USS Virginia blazes into contact with the massed Soviet Atlantic fishing fleet, which has been sheltering in remote waters since the outbreak of war, unable to return home but able to provide limited support to Soviet raiders and submarines. The battle finds the Soviets harboring two raiders - the Sovremmeny-class destroyer Rastoropny, thought lost in the Battle of the Norwegian Sea 18 months ago, and the Akula-class submarine K-154. Rastoropny has been sheltering with the fishing fleet for over a year after being damaged in the Norwegian Sea, but successfully breaking out and joining the fishermen. The fleet has been unable to repair the destroyer (it is now running on one shaft and has but two older-model P-80 SS-N-22 Sunburn missiles remaining) but it has recently proved itself able to defend its countrymen, having shot down the SAAF Boeing a few days prior. The fleet's Ka-26 helicopter has been grounded for many months, so early warning is maintained by a screen of picket trawlers. The Sierra-class sub K-231, which inadvertently caused the fishing fleet to reveal its location, is also in the area, en route to join it.

Virginia launches her sole SH-2G helicopter to gain visibility of what lurks over the horizon. The Seasprite's radar reveals a virtual Soviet flotilla of over 75 vessels; the Soviet force's location is relayed back to the ship and then back to South African and American commands ashore. Within 20 minutes the South African Air Force has launched another Boeing 707, playing the multiple roles of ELINT aircraft, airborne command post and tanker for the accompanying strike force of four Buccaneer light bombers armed with AS.30 anti-ship missiles. Virginia launches her three remaining Harpoon anti-ship missiles at what its commander hopes is the Soviet destroyer; during the five minutes the missiles take to arrive over the target the cruiser's crew detects one of the submerged Soviet submarines and LtCdr Hans Brupp, the helicopter pilot, is recalled to localize and prosecute the contact as the American cruiser charges at the Soviet fleet at top speed. The Harpoons close on the Soviet fleet; one hits the factory ship (a vessel that processes fish caught by other trawlers) Vasili Krennekov, one is shot down by the Rastoropny's point defense 30mm cannon and the third hits the Soviet destroyer 25m short of the bow, knocking the dual 130mm gun turret off its mounting, starting a fierce fire. The shock wave from the explosion knocks most of the destroyer's electronics offline and ruptures pipes throughout the ship.

As Virginia closes in, she engages the outlying picket ships with her 5-inch guns, concentrating fire on the trawlers' bridges to disable their ability to maneuver and communicate. Brupp is able to obtain a MAD (magnetic anomaly detector) hit on the K-154 and turns and drops a Mk-46 lightweight torpedo on the Soviet sub. The torpedo hits within 30 seconds but its 96-pound warhead is insufficient to breach the subs inner pressure hull. The helo turns back to its parent ship to rearm (it carries only a single torpedo), allowing the damaged sub to slink away at low speed.

While Virginia's helicopter is on the aft deck (halting fire from the aft 5-inch gun), the Soviet destroyer restores enough fighting capability to launch its two remaining anti-ship missiles at the American cruiser, its location being relayed by the picket ships. One of the missiles fails to lock on the nuclear cruiser and the second is hit by Virginia's Phalanx anti-missile gun systems. Shortly thereafter the South African Boeing appears over the horizon and begins verbal relays of ship locations to the American ship (there being no data link system in common between the two nations) as well as the approaching bombers. The Buccaneers launch all eight of their AS.30 anti-ship missiles at Rastoropny, five of which hit, breaking her back and making the fires aboard even worse; within four hours the battered ship slips beneath the waves.

Brupp returns to the air having rearmed with two more Mk-46 torpedoes, discarding the spare fuel tank he had on the prior flight, and attempts to re-locate the Akula-class boat. He fails to do so, Virginia's hull-mounted sonar of little use and with crude jamming of the sononbuoy relay circuit by the Soviet fishing craft. Virginia slows its rate of advance when it receives word of Rastoropny's condition, concentrating its effort on sinking the largest Soviet support ships while dispatching a motor whaleboat to capture the Soviet tanker Captain Pershin. After 45 minutes the cruiser has nearly run out of ammunition for its guns and shooting comes to a halt, allowing the gun barrels to cool as the whaleboat comes alongside the tanker. After a short firefight the Captain Pershin's Soviet ensign is struck and the Stars and Stripes flown; unfortunately the tanker's cargo tanks are nearly dry. As the remaining trawlers scatter in all directions a flight of B-52s arrives overhead; the high-flying bombers are laden with unguided munitions (all that were available in Kenya) which are of little use against the Soviet fleet. Virginia pulls alongside the fish transport ship Motovskiy Zaliv, capturing it and its cargo of 4000 tons of frozen fish. The trio of American-controlled ships soon departs, aware of the presence of enemy submarines, having sunk eight trawlers, two factory ships and the Soviet destroyer.

Nhaziern Khazi, a drug smuggler turned Pasdaran militiaman, decides to strike out on his own. He slips away from the camp at night and makes contact with an old acquaintance who he knows has contact with the communist Tudeh guerrillas. A meeting is scheduled.

The gas tank in CIA agent David Hudson's stolen Lada finally runs dry, forcing him to abandon the rugged car and resume his journey on foot. The vehicle had, however, enabled him to cover over 800 km of hostile territory in less than 72 hours, leaving him outside the town of Võru in southeastern Estonia. Hudson sets out on foot for the Baltic coast.

[chico20854]

May 12, 1998

As food and fuel become increasingly hard to come by legitimately, Grunge McLeod, a biker in Butler, Pennsylvania and several of his associates in the Blackhawk Bike Club turn to crime for survival.


Unofficially,

Fighting continues in Mexico City between various armed groups; it is unclear who is in charge.

The Pact offensive in southern Germany rolls on, with the appearance on the battlefield of the Hungarian 1st Corps and Czechoslovakian 1st Army opposite British troops south of Nuremberg and in the former US Army training center at Grafenwohr, respectively. Rumors swirl that additional Soviet and Italian troops are moving through the rear area in Austria and occupied Bavaria.

The assessment team sent to the Sonico hydroelectric plant, located under the Gavia pass in northern Italy, completes its evaluation. The plant's subterranean control center and generator hall are intact and operable, but 1000 liters of fuel are needed to run diesel generators to restore operation before enough electrical power is delivered for self-sufficiency. Transmission lines from the plant appear intact for several kilometers down the mountains from the plant.

US Navy Seebees of the 58th Naval Construction Battalion and repair, salvage and maintenance sailors assigned to 5th Fleet begin an effort to transform the damaged guided missile frigate Samuel Eliot Morison into a stationary defense platform for Lavan Island in the Persian Gulf. 5th Fleet experts have determined that the ship, damaged by a Soviet missile in 1997, cannot be repaired in the region and that there is no reasonable expectation that it can be towed home for repair. Therefore, employment of the ship's weapon systems (chiefly its Mk-13 missile launcher with SM-1MR surface to air missiles and 76mm multi-use gun) to defend the oil processing facilities and adjacent port while the frigate's generators support critical infrastructure ashore (chiefly the pumping stations that keep a steady flow of crude oil going) are the best use for the vessel.

[chico20854]

May 13, 1998

The Dutch 1st Mechanized Division is stood down, its surviving personnel assigned to other units.

Unofficially,

The bubonic plague is spreading along the US West Coast, with new cases reported in Astoria, Oregon and Riverside, California.

In Alaska, X Corps has finally amassed sufficient food and fuel to resume its pursuit of the Soviet force retreating towards Anchorage.

Southwest of Ulm, the German town of Erbach an der Donau is held by a mixed force of Bundeswehr troops of the 10th Panzer Division and Danish reservists of the 2nd Jutland Regiment, forming the junction between the Danish Expeditionary Force and IV German Korps. The town is separated from the Pact lines by the Danube River and low-lying marshy ground between the shore and the town's built-up area; the prior days' Pact attacks have only eliminated some of the NATO observation posts on an island opposite the town. At dawn the Soviet 62nd Tank Division, a mobilization-only division from Ukraine equipped with an array of obsolescent armor (T-34s, T-10s and SU-100s) tries to force a crossing onto the island opposite the town. NATO artillery observers from the schloss (castle) overlooking the town from the far side call in effective artillery and mortar fire which strips the supporting infantry off the Soviet armor. The Soviet tanks turn back, seeking the cover of nearby vegetation. The German commander's request for air or further artillery support to eliminate the sheltering tanks is denied; no ammunition can be spared to engage enemy troops not in direct contact.

The small group of transports carrying replacement equipment (much of the heavy weapons and vehicles of the 46th Infantry Division) arrives in Bremerhaven, Germany. The vehicles aboard the Cape Turner and Baltimore Freedom can be driven off the ships' ramps, while the supplies on the Baltimore Freedom and Manley Falmouth are unloaded using the ships' onboard cranes; this allows them to be unloaded without requiring the heavily damaged port's cranes to have power and masses of stevedore labor.
The convoy's escort, the destroyer USS Stump, remains on patrol offshore.

Nhaziern Khazi meets with a Tudeh guerrilla leader, who agrees on a bounty to be paid for assistance in attacking Khazi's Pasdaran unit.

In the south Atlantic, the USS Virginia and the two ships it captured in battle two days prior have turned north. What little fuel that remains aboard the tanker Captain Pershin is transferred to the refrigerated cargo ship Motovskiy Zaliv as well as spares, lubricants and other items of value that cannot be used by the American cruiser. The upper two levels of the forward hold are fitted with bedding, and an American prize crew guards the transfer of the crews of the two Soviet ships as well as the POWs captured in April from the trawler Star of Crimea into the hold. The ship is dispatched to Norfolk, Virginia while the cruiser turns west, heading for the Pacific.

[chico20854]

May 14, 1998

Nothing in canon for the day.

In Yukon, a GRU technical team arrives at the Canadian Security Establishment (the Canadian counterpart to the National Security Agency) ELINT station outside Whitehorse. The team had been stationed on Shemya Island, Alaska to evaluate the various monitoring devices the US had operated there; they see some of the same equipment and are overall amazed at the relative sophistication of the electronics compared to the much more privative in use by the GRU.

The 7th Panzer Division’s headquarters is located by a Spetsnaz team from the 18th Spetsnaz Brigade, infiltrated at the onset of the offensive. The Soviet commandos relay the position to the 442nd Missile Brigade, which, in a rare feat of efficiency, has a SS-21 missile en route within 90 minutes. The nuclear-tipped missile scores a near-hit, landing within the headquarters' perimeter fence, destroying the German facility and the command staff. The nuclear attack is followed shortly thereafter with an intense but short artillery barrage, expending the last of 41st Army's chemical weapons, which is then followed by a mass assault by two of the Army's motor-rifle divisions. By nightfall, the German positions have been overrun, and scattered survivors break out northward.

The Soviet 41st Army repeats its dawn attack on the town of Erbach an der Donau, achieving the same result (no territory captured, several vehicles lost to defensive fire).

The Soviet Kilo-class submarine B-888, operating in the English Channel after sinking the British frigate HMS Achilles in April, is running low on torpedoes, fuel and stores. Not having sighted any Allied shipping in several days (partly due to the lack of traffic, partly due to persistent fog), the boat's commander decides to have his weapons officer deploy the remaining mines aboard (including conversion of all but one of the remaining torps to mines) before turning for home. Given the dire conditions on the Kola, he aims for the Baltic Fleet submarine base at Paldiski, Estonia.

The Marines of the 4th Marine Division have their first clash with Marine deserters, a band that calls itself the Junkyard Dawgs. The Dawgs are composed of members of a motor-transport unit that was cut off and destroyed while running supplies to the isolated 1st Marine Division in the fall; they have spent the last several months making their way south, living off the land and what they can plunder from local civilians, but find the prospect of returning to military discipline unattractive.

After a month in transit, the 106th Motor-Rifle (my 232nd Rear Area Protection) Division has reached the border of Austria and Hungary. It has expended all of its food and fuel, and made it across Hungary mostly by begging/extorting supplies from local authorities, who determine that it is better to provide the division what it needs to move on than deny it and have the unit remain where they are.

In the south Atlantic, the damaged Akula-class submarine K-154 meets up with the Sierra-class K-231 after both boats have escaped the destruction of the Soviet South Atlantic fishing fleet. K-154 transfers stocks of frozen fish to the other boat as their captains agree to strike out for Maputo, Mozambique, hoping that they will receive a friendly reception there.

[chico20854]

May 15, 1998

Nothing official for the day. Unofficially,

The Franco-Belgian government authorizes the military to provide covert aid to Quebecois separatists; previous aid was limited to advisors to help integrate the various military, police and militia formations into the Quebec National Army; the aid is now to include providing munitions (all NATO-standard items, many from Belgian Army stocks that cannot be definitively traced back to France or Belgium) as well as food and limited amounts of precious fuel.

Members of the Ho-Chunk tribal militia turn back a group of refugees seeking entry to the tribe's territory in west-central Wisconsin. The refugees are not natives.

The Polish government makes a desperate plea to their Soviet and Czech allies for seed for the spring planting. The 1997 farming year was disastrous thanks to the war twice crisscrossing the country, with what scant reserves and the seed stock used up over the winter to sustain the civilian population (and a great deal of the Soviet forces stationed within the country).

Erbach an der Donau is hit again with another attack by the Soviet 62nd Tank Division. Inexplicably, the attack is a near mirror-image of the attack the same unit launched in the same sector just days prior. It is turned back by the mixed force of Danish and German defenders.

In South Africa, the Security Service scores a major success when radio-location units pinpoint the location of the safehouse where the leaders of the right-wing AWB terrorist group are gathered. A hastily arranged heliborne assault by troops of the 5 Recon Commando catches the plotters asleep, allowing them to be captured mostly alive.

[chico20854]

May 16, 1998

Nother day when canon is silent. Unofficially,

BMSA (Boatswains Mate Apprentice) Rodney Cutler in Brownsville, Texas is involved with another incident with Mexican citizens. He is one of six sailors who, faced with desperate refugees refusing to return to Mexico, beats the men to within inches of their lives, throwing the unconcious men into a truck along with their families before dumping them on the far side of the US-Mexico border station.

The American attack submarine USS Baton Rouge, which departed on an unauthorized patrol from Bremerton, Washington in the chaotic days after the initial nuclear attacks on the US, returns from its voyage when it sails into Pearl Harbor. It is docked alongside the nuclear attack sub USS Pargo. Baton Rouge's captain is escorted to fleet headquarters to answer for his actions in December.

The Soviet 62nd Tank Division launches a third attack on the defenders of Erbach an der Donau, using the same avenues of approach. The attack is slowed down by the need for the tank drivers to weave between the wrecks of the prior two attacks. Like the others, the attack is unsuccessful and the division is forced back to its start lines.

The Dutch freighter Randfontien, carrying a cargo of grain from South Africa, hits a mine off the Dutch coast and sinks in shallow water off The Hague.

In the early morning hours the Pasdaran militia garrison in the small village of Asmadabad, east of Shiraz, is overrun in a surprise Tudeh attack. The Tudeh commander thanks the traitor in the Pasdaran ranks, Nhaziern Khazi, who ensured that he and his cousins and friends were on guard and allowed the Tudeh rebels into the village prior to the confused massacre.

The prior night's raid on AWB leadership has a devastating effect on the ongoing rural terror campaign. The leaderless movement finds itself adrift, and resistance to government authority rapidly begins to fade as the government tightens control of food and fuel distribution.

[chico20854]

May 17, 1998

Yet another day where I'm on my own! Unofficially,

After over a week of perilous travel along the frozen Yukon River, the troops of B Co., 2nd Battalion 297th Infantry (part of the 1st Infantry Brigade (Arctic Recon)) secure the USAF forward operating base at Galena, Alaska, which the Air Force was forced to abandon the prior summer.

The defense of Erbach an der Donau finally comes under pressure, not from the now-daily frontal assault by the 62nd Tank Division on the same entrenched defenders with artillery support on call but from Soviet forces advancing along the north bank of the Danube from the city of Ulm, which fell under Soviet control several days ago.

Days after departing its last patrol station in the English Channel and successfully avoiding Belgian naval patrols and Danish minefields, the Kilo-class submarine B-888 passes through the Kattegat, the narrow sea that forms the mouth of the Baltic. Ignoring the long-compromised idea of Swedish neutrality, the Soviet boat traverses Swedish territorial waters. Its passage is noted by a bottom-mounted hydrophone array, and the Swedish Navy dispatches a former Coast Guard C-212 maritime patrol aircraft to investigate. The plane's observer sees the submerged boat, and the plane circles overhead while patrol boats with depth charges are sortied. (The Kilo's periscope-mounted surface-to-air missile system has been out of missiles for over a year). After several hours of hunting and evading, the Soviet boat, damaged and with dead batteries, surfaces for the crew to abandon ship before being scuttled. Swedish sailors board the boat and secure the seacocks before it can be sent to the bottom; the boat is taken under tow to the nearby naval base in Goteborg.

CIA Agent David Hudson, after spending five nights walking through rural Estonia, arrives at the small fishing village of Võiste on the coast of the Gulf of Riga. He makes contact with a "CIA contractor", a local fisherman whose father was shot by the Soviets after their recapture of Estonia in 1944-5 (a not uncommon occurrence). The fishing boat captain is still willing to continue his long-standing service for the CIA (and MI6), in exchange for Hudson's remaining gold coins. After dark the captain's fishing boat sets sail, taking his passenger out of Soviet territorial waters.

[chico20854]

May 18, 1998

Nothing in canon for the day. Unofficially,

President Munson is "extremely frustrated" when his phone calls are nearly drowned out by a high-pitch squealing on the line, making communications with his far-flung subordinatesd nearly impossible.

The commander of the 347th Strategic Missile Squadron orders the initiation of an effort to harden the dispersal sites of the 21 Hard Mobile Launchers his squadron possessed.

The defenders of Erbach an der Donau pivot their dwindling reserves to the town's northeast approaches as their Soviet opponents advancing from Ulm send a dismounted detachment northwest to encircle the town. The commitment of reserves to that flank causes the burden of turning back the day's daily frontal assault by the 62nd Tank Division to shift to the Luftwaffe, which commits some of its scarce close air support aircraft to the skies overhead. A pair of Alphajets overfly the treeline that the Soviets have attacked from repeatedly, each dropping two BLU-23B napalm bombs, enveloping them in flames and disrupting the Soviet armored formation. As they turn for another pass with their onboard 27mm cannon they are bracketed by fire from the Soviet division's anti-aircraft guns (the mobilization-only division never received surface-to-air missiles). One of the light bombers is downed by a 57mm hit, while the other heads back to base trailed by a thin line of smoke.

A Swedish naval Super Puma helicopter overflies the captured B-888 and disembarks several intelligence and signals officers on the partially flooded Kilo-class sub's hull. They head below immediately, headed for the sub's radio compartment.

Dutch authorities launch a rescue and salvage operation to retrieve as much of the grain cargo aboard the mined freighter Randfontien which is aground off The Hague.

Nhaziern Khazi and a small group of friends and cousins strike out on their own, one of hundreds of marauder bands wandering the no-mans-land of central Iran.

CIA officer David Hudson spends the day at sea as the small fishing boat he is a passenger on transits the mouth of the Gulf of Riga past the destroyed remains of Soviet Naval coastal defense radars, observation towers and gun and missile batteries.

[chico20854]

May 19, 1998

President Munson suffers a nervous breakdown.

The newly-reformed 40th Infantry Division arrives at Camp Roberts, California and begins battling armed bands as the authorities struggle to maintain order. The unit had to take a long route from Oregon to avoid the quarantines of San Francisco and Sacramento.

Unofficially,

Mexican officials spread word among the masses of refugees huddled around Matamoros about the abuse of their compatriots inflicted by US Navy sailors over the border in Brownsville.

In Mexico City an armed standoff has settled in between the Presidential Guard, which has declared loyalty to the PARM party, a nascent militia composed of various military deserters and police that is loyal to the ruling PAN party, and a coalition of narco traffickers that are taking advantage of the disorder.

The bandit gang of US Army deserters in the former East Germany forms a subordinate gang. Led by a cousin of 5th Squad "Drill Private Major" Malcolm Green, 5th Squadron (led by "Vice Airman No Class" Aubrey Green) is composed largely of US Air Force deserters. 5th Squadron heads for territory to its south, hoping to prey on traffic transiting the roads between the ports on the former West German North Sea coast and the front lines east of the ruins of Berlin.

The German and Danish defence of Erbach an der Donau begins to crack. After the prior day's loss over the town, the Luftwaffe is unwilling to commit additional aircraft and artillery and mortar ammunition is running short; the defense's last reserves have been committed as Soviet forces threaten the routes out of the town to the north and west. The 62nd Tank Division tries a different approach from the full-scale frontal attacks it has tried for the past several days; instead the unit's obsolescent T-54 and T-34 tanks stand back under the cover of the burned-out forest and wrecked vehicles of previous attacks and pound NATO defensive positions with precision fire.

The small Estonian fishing boat carrying CIA officer David Hudson reaches the central Baltic and continues sailing west towards the Swedish coast.

[chico20854]

May 20, 1998

Nothing official for the day. Unofficially,

Following Munson's breakdown, the Secretary of State is sworn in as President of the United States. Munson is escorted out of the bunker in south-central Virginia to a comfortable home at the Yorktown Naval Weapons Station outside Newport News, where he can rest.

In Colorado Springs, the Joint Chiefs and FEMA managers agree that to maximize the utility of the limited trickle of fuel available for transportation, that maximum use is to be made of rail and river transportation. (A gallon of diesel can move 59 ton-miles by truck, 202 by train and 514 ton-miles by barge).

Erbach an der Donau finally falls to Soviet troops, with scattered German and Danish troops slipping away through the woods and hills outside the city. The Soviet victory has come at great cost and the NATO defense has held up the advance of the entire 41st Army.

The Estonian fishing boat carrying CIA agent David Hudson arrives in view of the Swedish island of Gotland. The CIA man makes radio contact with the acting CIA station chief in Stockholm and is instructed to land and surrender himself to the local defense force.

The Dutch salvage team aboard the freighter Randfontien reports that nearly half of the ship's cargo of grain is still dry and undamaged but that the ship cannot be refloated, such is the damage inflicted by the mine the ship detonated six days prior. Unloading the ship, however, will require a stream of barges and construction equipment, since the ship is listing at an angle that precludes use of its onboard cranes.

In Shiraz, Iran, the state munitions plant brings online its second production line, turning out track pads for the IPA's small but useful fleet of Scorpion light tanks. The British-educated chief engineer hopes that once the plant's workers before proficient in the Scorpion pads that they can expand to other track sections for the Scorpions as well as pads for the plethora of other tracked AFVs in use by Allied forces in Iran.

[chico20854]

May 21, 1998

Nothing official for today. Unofficially,

The new American President, the former Secretary of State, is briefed on the myriad challenges the nation faces, including over 30 percent casualties from the nuclear attacks and aftermath, a collapse of the economy, what is looking to be a poor spring planting and petroleum production of approximately 25 percent of a year earlier.

The Joint Chiefs' logistic coordinator, the J-4, issues a directive that civilian rail and river transportation is to be organized along military lines. Regional military commanders are ordered to propose strategic rail and river corridors where remaining assets are to be concentrated.

The Freedom-class freighter Rhode Island Freedom, en route unescorted to Pusan, South Korea with a cargo of replacement vehicles and foodstuffs for 8th US Army, strikes a mine while traversing the Kanmon Straits (separating the Japanese islands of Honshu and Kyushu). While taking on water the captain radios for help; Japanese tugs respond but are unwilling to approach the ship, afraid of striking additional mines. The ship settles in as the Japanese Maritime Self Defense Force dispatches a minesweeper to clear a way for the tugs.

CIA officer David Hudson lands on Gotland Island in the mid-Baltic and is nearly immediately taken into custody by Swedish coast defense troops.

The Soviet Kilo-class submarine B-888, captured by the Swedish Navy, arrives in the port of Goteborg, where the boat is rushed into a drydock for repairs. The intelligence officers that were flown aboard disembark, while the crew are hurried off to special facilities for interrogation before being transferred to POW camps.

Italian salvage experts complete their assessment of the Mese hydropower plant. Like the team at the Campore Basso plant, they determine that the underground facility has survived the nuclear exchange nearly intact and will require extensive repairs to the grid connections but can be fairly easily restored to operation.

[chico20854]

May 22, 1998

The Secretary of State, President Munson's successor, suffers heart failure and is replaced by the Secretary of Energy, June R. Flaherty. Flaherty is the United State's first woman president.

Unofficially,

The Japanese Maritime Self Defense Force minesweeper Takashima arrives in the Kanmon Straits and begins searching for Soviet mines near the damaged American freighter Rhode Island Freedom. By nightfall they have identified two additional devices on the seabed.

Pact forces are forced to pause their offensive in southern Germany while they consolidate their gains and await the arrival of another train carrying supplies from the Ukraine via the circuitous route through Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Austria.

A Dutch Navy salvage team begins scouring port facilities for barges and tug boats that can be used to support the salvage of the grounded freighter Randfontien. The team aboard the ship off The Hague's beach tries to secure the vessel to slow its deterioration as it is battered by waves and wind.

The Australian Navy dispatches the transport Jervis Bay and survey ship Cook, loaded with reinforcements (freshly trained recruits) for the Australian Mechanized Brigade fighting in Iran, from Sydney's HMAS Waterhen naval base. The small convoy is escorted by the frigate Torrens.

[chico20854]

May 23, 1998

Nothing official for the day. Unofficially,

The passes in Washington State's Cascade Mountains have cleared enough for Janet Clancy, daughter of the late Vice President Pemberton, her father, two Secret Service bodyguards and the family's cook to emerge from the remote cabin where they have sheltered since the Thanksgiving Day Massacre.

In the early morning hours the Japanese minesweeper Takashima declares the area between the damaged Rhode Island Freedom and the nearby port of Kokura "reasonably clear" of mines. The American freighter is towed into the harbor, where it is determined that the ship has taken on so much water that it has to be partially unloaded to avoid running aground before reaching the pier.

After two days in Swedish military custody, CIA officer David Hudson is transferred to a plainclothes civilian who identifies himself as a police officer. (He is likely an intelligence agent. Hudson knows better than to inquire.) They depart on the afternoon ferry to the mainland.

The Hungarian 53rd Mechanized Brigade in eastern Siberia decides to strike out overland, abandoning the Trans-Siberian Railroad, which is pockmarked with craters from American nuclear bombs dropped by B-2s flying "Golden Spike" missions along the route.

[chico20854]

May 24, 1998

Delayed by the effects of the nuclear strikes of 1997, a second convoy finally arrives from the US two months after it was originally supposed to arrive, bringing reinforcements and vitally needed ammunition as well as a single USANG jet fighter squadron. Accompanying the convoy are several naval auxiliaries that escaped the nuclear attacks on Norfolk and Charleston that have been assigned for CENTCOM.

Unofficially,

When Rear Admiral Scott McDowell receives word that his cousin June Flaherty has been named President he reaches out to her regarding his plan to use his command to assist in the recovery of New England.

Maritime salvage experts examine the mine-shattered Rhode Island Freedom and determine that the ship requires more significant repair than can be economically performed in the challenging environment of post-nuclear Kyushu. Local authorities declare the ship a total loss and, incidentally, seize it as well as its cargo of foodstuffs.

Professor Kristof Cikowski at the University of Lodz conceives of a way to restore operation to the millions of computers damaged by Electro-Magnetic Pulse by means of a hard-wired device to simulate the function of the computer's chip. He approaches University officials for approval to pursue the project.

[chico20854]

May 25, 1998

Canon is silent on today. Unofficially,

First Maritime Defense District commander MacDowell presents his plan to the new President. He provides Flaherty with specific language that enables him to escape control by any authority short of the Joint Chiefs, if he so chooses. Flaherty's staff write the orders, and already completely overwhelmed by the enormity of the job, she signs off on MacDowell's scheme after a few cursory questions and without consulting the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Specialist Cutler, in Germany, is reassigned from his comfortable duties attempting to repair and maintain HMMWVs and other vehicles assigned to 1st Battalion, 188th Air Defense Artillery, part of the 36th Infantry Division to one of the division's front-line battalions, the 2nd Battalion, 127th Infantry. Upon arrival he is quickly disavowed of any notion that he is there to maintain vehicles - he is put on duty overnight in a listening post 500 meters beyond the battalion's front line.

David Hudson, the CIA agent who was recently exfiltrated from northeast of Moscow, accompanied by a plainclothes Swedish official, is given a train and bus ticket to the small port town of Klädesholmen on Sweden's west coast.

In Jugoslavia, the reformed JSA force in the center of the country overruns Soviet positions in the town of Bosanska Dubica, sweeping down the valley of the Una River that forms the border between the republics of Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina.

The cruiser USS Virginia calls in Port Stanley in the Falkland Islands, where it takes on fresh water and trades some of its store of frozen fish (which the crew is more than tired of eating) for some fresh mutton. The ship's captain consults with the commander of the Falklands Defense Force on the situation in the region, and obtains permission to remain for a few days to allow the crew some time ashore and to make some minor repairs to the ship. The British are unable to provide any ammunition to replenish the cruiser's depleted magazines.

[chico20854]

May 26, 1998

Nothing in canon for the day. Unofficially,

Overwhelmed by the demands of the job and by the emotions invoked by the prior day's Memorial Day commemoration (a particularly solemn occasion given the nation's losses in the past 18 months), President June R. Flaherty, America's first female President, commits suicide.

In Mexico, the PRI (the semi-authoritarian party that ruled the country for over 75 years prior to the unrest of the mid-90s) calls for the caretaker government to step down, the military to restore order in the capital and the nation to demand dignified treatment of its citizens over the border in the U.S. The appeal is widely popular, but denounced by the PAN party (which holds the reins of the caretaker government) as posturing and detached from the reality of trying to govern a shattered nation.

Following the capture of the bridges over the Danube at Erbach an der Donau, 41st Army shifts its main line of effort to the northwest, heading for Stuttgart. Having taken a beating in the Danube crossing operations, it is reinforced by the Italian 3rd Corps on its western flank.

Engineers assigned to the 29th Infantry Division (Light) in Yemen restore the operation of one of the Aden refinery's extraction units, turning out 8,800 barrels of diesel, kerosene and gasoline daily. The unit requires a regular supply of Kuwaiti crude and waterborne service to take the product away; cleaning requirements dictate that these be on different tankers, or at least in separate tanks serviced by separate pumps and piping aboard a single tanker.

[chico20854]

May 27, 1998

The federal civilian government ceases to exist. The Joint Chiefs of Staff assume de facto control of the remainder of the executive branch.

Unofficially,

MacDowell wastes no time consolidating his new command. He abandons Cape Cod wholesale, taking everything and everyone of value from the Massachusetts Military Reserve. MacDowell even manages to scoop up a number of Coast Guard Auxiliary and Coast Guard Reservists who have been operating under Holsbirger's orders. Holsbirger is furious, but there is nothing he can do except hang onto everything he has left after MacDowell makes his grab.

The Soviet 16th Army, its fuel tanks refilled with Romanian diesel, launches an operation to drive the US VII Corps out of Ansbach. Its 57th Guards Motor Rifle Division launches a dawn attack on the outposts of the 1st and 36th Infantry Divisions, supported by the artillery of the 93rd Guards Motor-Rifle Division and the 168th Artillery Brigade. The American corps commander brings reserve companies into the town from outlying positions to the east and west of the city, relying on the scouts of the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment to screen his flanks.

CIA agent David Hudson is escorted aboard another small craft in the fishing port of Klädesholmen, Sweden, which sets sail after dark. Once out of territorial waters the craft is revealed as a CIA high speed transport craft, fitted with a pair of powerful diesel engines that propel the craft at 30 knots west.

Captain Christensen of the replica USS Constitution trades some of her stash of diamonds for a towed 20mm PIVAD gun and 15 .50-caliber M2HB machineguns.

[chico20854]

May 28, 1998

Nothing official for the day. Unofficially,

After slightly over a month in the Upper East Side marauder gang Hells Own, former Corporal Nathan Snyder instigates a fight with one of the other gang members, a tough former street fighter from Queens who seems to enjoy a higher "status" within the group. Snyder defeats the other member after a rough and tumble dustup that ends with Snyder's M9 bayonet at the other gangster's throat.

After a week of evaluation, regional military commanders have proposed several key transportation routes within the U.S. The intracoastal waterway from Norfolk to Brownsville, Texas, the Mississippi-Missouri-Ohio-Tennessee-Red River and Columbia-Snake River systems, coastal shipping along the west coast and from Hampton Roads to Maine are identified as the key water routes; strategic rail lines are identified from San Diego to Kansas City, Chicago, Buffalo and Boston; New Orleans to Green Bay and Chicago to Salt Lake City, continuing on to San Francisco.

The fighting for Ansbach, Germany continues as the lead battalions of the 57th Guards Motor-Rifle Division's 170th Guards and 174th Guards Motor-Rifle Regiments, veterans of hard fighting from the war's outbreak, gain the cover of the city's buildings. One of those structures is held by an extremely frightened Specialist Randolph Cutler, who has never seen battle in his months in Germany. The corps commander commits more of his precious reserves of ammunition and fuel to the city's defenders.

To the east, the British defenders of Nurenburg find themselves under increasing pressure from the Hungarians of the 1st Corps and the German 1st Korps is under attack by the Czechoslovakian 1st Army.

US Navy technical teams establish reliable connections between the permanently moored frigate Samuel Eliot Morison and shore, enabling the ship to provide reliable power to critical infrastructure on Lavan Island in the Persian Gulf.

The South African Army destroys what turns out to be the last AWB roadblock on a rural road outside the small town of Loxton. A Ratel 90 of the Regiment Oranjerivier takes out the bunker with three high explosive rounds.

[chico20854]

May 29, 1998

Another day with nothing in canon. Unofficially,

A landowner and his extended family arrive at the border of the Ho-Chunk tribal territory in west-central Wisconsin, demanding access to his family cabin which had been in his family for generations before being appropriated to house members of the Ho-Chunk tribe. He refuses to leave and tensions rise. One of his sons shoots the head of the checkpoint's militia force and the militiamen in overwatch positions in the trees open fire, killing all the adults and several of the children. The tribe adopts the children to raise as tribal members, unwilling to abandon them (the oldest is 7) in the chaos of post-nuclear America.

Word slowly spreads of the death of the last President of the United States. FEMA's Central Location Service, whose role is to continually track each successor at all times, to make sure all of them are never in the same place at the same time and locate the next successor in line, has broken down and it is unclear if any Senate-approved cabinet members remain alive. (The senior Senate-approved appointee in Virginia is the Acting Secretary of Agriculture, the former Deputy Director of the US Forest Service).

CIA agent David Hudson arrives at the British port of Sunderland, where he is dropped off by the CIA transport he is traveling on. During the voyage he is given a cover identity and a small amount of cash, allotted a month's leave following his long, arduous escape from the USSR, and ordered to begin rebuilding the CIA's network in the UK after he recovers.

As a third day of fighting continues in Ansbach, Germany, 16th Army commits a regiment, the 110th Guards Motor-Rifle, to reinforce the embattled 57th Motor-Rifle Division. The fighting in the city is a ruse, however, for as darkness falls the Soviet's main blow falls east and west of the city. Lead by several volleys of BM-21 and BM-27 rocket fire, the last of which contain HCN blood agent chemical rounds, artillery batters VII Corps' outposts. As the artillery fire diminishes the ground attack begins, the massed tanks of the 19th Guards and 20th Tank Divisions in the armored attack long feared by generations of American soldiers in Germany. The tank assault is successful, pushing back the pickets of the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment (to the west of the city) and a composite cavalry force composed of the 1st and 36th Division's divisional cavalry squadrons (the 1st Squadron, 4th Cavalry and 36th Cavalry Squadron (Composite), respectively) defending the city's eastern approaches.

The Soviet nuclear attack submarines - the damaged Akula-class K-154 and the Sierra-class K-231 - that had been operating in the South Atlantic arrive off Maputo, Mozambique. They are distressed to discover that the city's harbor was destroyed in December by South African nuclear bombs and that the surviving friendly shipping has also been sunk.

[chico20854]

May 30, 1998

Nothing in canon for the day. Unofficially,

Despite the desire of X Corps commanders to complete the pursuit of retreating Soviet forces back to Anchorage, they are unable to do so. The command is effectively frozen in place by lack of supply, cut off from overland connection to the rest of the US and Canada by Soviet forces in Yukon, landlocked, and with air supply nonexistent. The corps' soldiers are sustaining themselves by hunting, trapping and fishing as well as relying on the generosity of grateful civilians.

RainbowSix reports that a number of Warsaw Pact prisoners, led by Captain Nikolai Konev, a Spetsnaz officer captured in Norway, break out of the Okehampton POW Camp in Devon.

Having completed the unloading of stores, fuel, lubricants and the portion of the cargo consisting of foodstuffs from the shattered Freedom-class transport Rhode Island Freedom, authorities in Kokura, Japan establish radio contact with US 8th Army officials in Korea informing them that the ship's cargo of vehicles (nearly entirely composed of 3/4 and 5/4-ton trucks) are available for the Americans to pick up at their leisure.

Sunrise finds the lead regiments of the 19th Guards and 20th Tank Divisions cautiously advancing across open ground outside Ansbach, Germany, under constant harassing fire from American cavalry scouts and field artillery. The understrength tank battalions advance along the same frontage that prewar doctrine dictates for full-strength units, avoiding concentrations that would render them attractive to NATO tactical nuclear strikes; the American defense is severely hindered by the near-total depletion of anti-tank missile stocks. Within the town, the commanders of the 1st and 36th Infantry Divisions issue orders for their MP companies to escort excess support and service units out of the city, while shifting hard-pressed infantry battalions to prepare defenses on the flanks. A relieved Specialist Cutler is assigned to create a hardened fighting position in the basement of a gasthaus on the city's eastern edge; he is overjoyed to discover an untapped keg of beer in the cellar. The work is quickly abandoned as he enjoys some of Germany's finest, despite his deep affection for his native Pittsburgh's Iron City.

The DIA first identifies Nhaziern Khazi's band of marauders, one of hundreds of such groups they are tracking the existence of.

[chico20854]

May 31, 1998

Another day with nothing in canon. Unofficially,

42nd Infantry Division deserter Nathan Snyder has found himself a girlfriend within the Hells Own marauder gang in New York - the gang's informal leader's little sister.

In Lodz Poland, Professor Kristof Cikowski makes a presentation of his idea to a joint committee of other electrical engineering professors and the university's Communist Party leadership. They view his concept skeptically and are reluctant to allocate scarce resources to his project, but reluctantly authorize him and two graduate students to be exempt from mandatory civil works duties, which normally consume over 20 hours of labor each week, and permit him to scavenge the campus for electronic materials and parts that may be useful in his project.

North of Ansbach, Germany the lead regiments of the 19th Guards and 20th Tank Divisions link up, cutting off most of the American 1st and 36th Infantry Divisions in the town. Specialist Cutler's fire team leader and squad leader are killed by a Soviet mortar barrage, leaving him unsupervised. He retreats to the safety of the cellar and the welcoming tap of the keg it shelters. Responding to the envelopment, V US Corps begins movement south from its winter quarters to the northwest around Fulda. 16th Army rushes troops forward to reinforce the encircling force, denying the commander of the 19th Guards' 99th Reconnaissance Battalion's request to pursue the retreating American support elements. The Soviet force is becoming increasingly constrained by supply shortages, however, with artillery commanders having to ration rounds and the deputy commander for the rear scouring the territory they are occupying for German tank trucks (military or civilian) to augment the Army's to move fuel to forward troops.

To the west of Ansbach, 41st Army and the Italian 3 Corps have captured the town of Esslingen, outside Stuttgart.

The American cruiser USS Virginia departs Stanley in the Falklands Islands, its fresh water tanks full and with a slightly better rested and fed crew. The weather is awful as the full South Atlantic Winter buffets the region.

American advisors detached from the 101st Air Assault Division assist newly-trained Iranian troops of the 9th Airmobile Brigade in their first offensive operation. The IPA force makes a dawn air assault from a collection of UH-1s and various other variants (two-engine Bell 212s and four-rotor Bell 412s, from a variety of manufacturers) on a marauder stronghold in the mountains northeast of Bushehr. The raid is successful, with light Iranian casualties and nearly half the sleeping bandit force captured alive.

[chico20854]

June 1, 1998

The replica USS Constitution obtains a cargo of food and general supplies for the population of the Azores.

Unofficially,

map (https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1xdrgysPCrQrSqQqiQL6DZAMkHZe4Y6U&usp=sharing)
The day finds the military in the continental US widely spread on disaster relief, internal security and food distribution duties. There are less than three division equivalents of fully equipped combat troops (the 49th AD, 42nd ID and 194th and 197th Brigades), three other trained divisions (the 4th AD, 17th AbnDiv and 46th ID) and a number of independent regiments and brigades that are trained but lack equipment and a wide range of training units as well as scattered military police and engineer units supporting civilian government functions.

The Joint Chiefs, who have had plenty to do from the moment they took charge, become aware of the new orders concerning the First Maritime Defense District. Flaherty hadn't consulted them. Eventually, minutes of the day reveal that the President, who had committed suicide, had executed some sort of orders regarding the Coast Guard and Navy chains of command in New England.

The major decision the Joint Chiefs make today, however, is to cut the allocation of food provided by military units to civilians to 1200 calories a day, in response to dwindling reserves and the arrival of fresh food in many gardens across the country.

The group of escaped POWs from the Okehampton POW camp splits up, with most of the men following Captain Konev. He decides to head to the safety of the Dartmoor Forest.

With Pact forces continuing their advances in southern Germany, the Royal Canadian Air Force decides to evacuate its remaining base in the region, at Baden–Soellingen. (The RCAF base at Lahr was obliterated by a Soviet SS-20 IRBM in November). The USAF dispatches a C-130 of the 180th Tactical Airlift Squadron (Missouri Air National Guard) to evacuate the stockpile of tactical nuclear bombs and the American security element; its departure flight is escorted by the remaining six flyable CF-18s (F/A-18s) of 439 Squadron RCAF. A convoy of ground vehicles leaves at dusk, carrying ground crews, command staff and what tools and spare parts can be hastily gathered.

In surrounded Ansbach the American troops that are veterans of the long retreat across Poland coach the young replacements about how to break out of Soviet encirclement; the terrified Specialist Cutler, obviously drunk, retreats to the safety of his cellar as Soviet mortar barrages disrupt the defenders' activity.

The largest of the Italian-supported puppet armies in Jugoslavia, the Croatian Nationalist Army, musters two brigades as the Italians begin a mass conscription campaign that drafts boys and men from age 14 to 65.

[chico20854]

June 2, 1998

The United Brotherhood of Fishermen seize Cape Cod.

Unofficially,

The reaction to the news of the cut to food allocations is quick and violent. Rioting breaks out in areas around the nation as desperate civilians attempt to seize the food that the military is refusing to deliver. In California, Texas and Arizona the rioting is directed at refugee camps sheltering tens of thousands of Mexican refugees, who are (unfairly) blamed for "stealing the food that rightfully belongs to Americans". The attacks on the refugee camps turn into massacres, as overwhelmed security forces are unable (and in some cases unwilling) to protect their charges.

The American breakout from Ansbach starts at dawn. VII Corps' composite cavalry force composed of the 1st Squadron, 4th Cavalry and 36th Cavalry Squadron (Composite), outside the pocket on the east side and the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment, outside on the west, launch probing attacks to discover the weakest points along the encircling forces line. 2nd Squadron, 2nd Cavalry achieves success against the 19th Guards Tank Division, and is able to identify its opponent as the 37th Guards Tank Regiment, locating its headquarters as it becomes apparent that the Soviet force is nearly immobile. (It turns out that the regiment's force of T-62 tanks is, in fact, nearly out of fuel, the convoy of trucks dispatched to refuel them lost in the German countryside). The regimental headquarters' location is quickly passed up the chain of command and within 15 minutes it is hit by a 1.1-kiloton artillery round fired by a 8-inch howitzer of the 3rd Battalion, 5th Artillery, assigned to the 210th Field Artillery Brigade. The American cavalry force, reinforced by the 1st Squadron, 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment (attached from V Corps) launches an attack in the immediate aftermath of the strike and within an hour makes contact with the 1st Infantry Division's 4th Battalion, 37th Armor. Under an umbrella of supporting artillery fire from the massed artillery batteries of VII Corps, reinforced by guns of the 135th Field Artillery Brigade (Missouri National Guard) from 4th Army, the two encircled divisions evacuate the city.

As the final Bradleys leave the burning town, a terrified Specialist Randolph Cutler decides that the evacuation is too perilous and that he is best off in the gasthaus basement with its stockpile of food and quarter-keg of fine Bavarian lager.

The Shiraz state munitions plant in Iran opens a new facility on the outskirts of the city, turning out one ton of TNT high explosive daily.

[chico20854]

June 3, 1998

Nothing official for the day. Unofficially,

As the Joint Chiefs learn the sordid details of MacDowell's coup they have far bigger fish to fry. MacDowell still obeys orders (albeit not always from the Commandant of the Coast Guard or Atlantic Fleet Headquarters) and is maintaining control of a useful cantonment where so many others have simply melted away or turned warlord. The orders granting MacDowell his unique command are never altered.

A luxury hotel complex in Acapulco, Mexico hosts a gathering of shadowy power brokers who seek to take advantage of the situation to enrich themselves and end the chaos that threatens to overtake the entire nation.

The Danish Expeditionary Corps and IV German Korps fall back on Stuttgart under pressure from 41st Army and the Italian 3rd Corps.

VII US Corps, having broken out of Ansbach, retreats through Wurzburg as 16th Army commits the relatively fresh 93rd Motor-Rifle Division to join the 20th Tank Division in pursuit.

In Ansbach, troops of the 57th Guards Motor-Rifle Division search the now-quiet city block by block; the search is slow as the veteran troops search for booby traps as well as booty from the wealthy West German homes and businesses. Specialist Cutler remains in his cellar, hopelessly drunk and oblivious to the situation outside.

The cruiser USS Virginia, patrolling the approaches to the Cape of Good Hope, overtakes one of the Soviet trawlers that escaped the carnage that the ship and the South Africans inflicted on the massed South Atlantic Soviet fishing fleet. The nuclear-powered ship draws alongside and sends a boarding party aboard, which seizes the trawler's cargo of (more) frozen fish as well as lubricants and much of the trawler's fuel, leaving only enough for the Soviet crew to limp into the nearest Argentine port where they will likely be interdicted.

[chico20854]

June 4, 1998

Nothing official for the day. Unofficially,

In the aftermath of the effective final collapse of the civilian federal government, there are no remaining USDA officials to raise the alarm that, as the spring planting season comes to an end, only 40 million acres (seven percent of the 521 million acres planted in 1997) have been planted, mostly on small farms that are more fuel-intensive than large tracts. (This is not entirely a negative, as the smallholdings are more advantageous for working by the masses of refugee labor that are providing much of the power for the American farm of 1998).

In Northern Ireland the fighting between Catholic Republicans (supported by the armed fighters of the IRA and Irish Army) and largely Protestant Loyalists (represented on the battlefield by the British Army Ulster Defense Regiment, the civilian Royal Ulster Constabulary and a loose alliance of armed loyalist militias), which has been largely stagnant for many months as neither side can muster sufficient troops and firepower for offensive operations, rumbles to life. The resumption of fighting does not immediately result in any changes of territory held but does increase the misery and suffering of the province's population.

Following up on successful Pact attacks elsewhere along the wide front in southern Germany, the Hungarian 2nd Corps launches an attack on the British II Corps, which is deeply embedded in Nuremburg. To the east, the battered German I Korps withdraws from Bayreuth, abandoning the city to the advancing Czech 1st Army.

In southern New South Wales the Ned Kelly gang launches another raid. Mirroring its original namesake, the group hits the bank in the small rural town of Jerilderie, making off with over AUS$50,000 in cash (of questionable value).

[chico20854]

June 5, 1998

Canon is silent on the day. Unofficially,

The bubonic plague continues its spread through the western US, with outbreaks in Colorado, New Mexico and Nebraska. One of those infected is the FEMA advisor to the Joint Chiefs, whose deputy assumes his duties until he returns to good health.

Anti-Mexican rioting continues in American states that border Mexico as nativists execute a campaign of extermination. Several camps housing Mexican refugees are unexpectedly defended by recently arrived armed men, variously rumored to be Mexican Army troops and members of private criminal armies loyal to various drug cartels.

RainbowSix reports that much of the agricultural land in the Country of Lincolnshire consists of former marshland known as the Fens, which were drained during the 18th and 19th Centuries. Lying just a few meters above sea level, prior to the war the fens were protected from flooding by a series of embankments and over 250 pumping stations; now a lack of electricity means most of these pumping stations have ceased to operate, leaving the fens exposed to the risk of flooding.

A dazed and dirty Specialist Cutler ventures out of his cellar in Ansbach and wanders the deserted and still-smoldering town. Not being entirely within his wits, he is soon surprised by a patrol of the 57th Guards Motor-Rifle Division and captured before he can get a shot off.

In response to the cutoff of trained replacements from the US, XVIII Airborne Corps establishes a small airborne school at Ad Damman, Saudi Arabia to turn out airborne-qualified troops for the 82nd Airborne Division and other supporting units.

[chico20854]

June 6, 1998

Nothing official for the day. Unofficially,

Anti-Mexican rioting continues in Texas and California, with pitched battles raging between armed Mexicans and informal American militias in California's Imperial Valley and near Del Rio, Texas. Both sides are armed with small arms, mostly civilian hunting and semi-automatic weapons. Casualties are modest on both sides, although the civilian death toll is breathtaking, with fighting raging in crowded camps that have not been evacuated by either side, the Mexican defenders wanting the civilians to remain as cover and the nativist militias aiming to exterminate the refugees.

Arriving at Dartmoor Forest in Devon, Captain Nikolai Konev and his group of escaped POWs, desperate for food, weapons and shelter, fall upon a small caravan park, overwhelming the few lightly armed men (and two women) and seizing the trailers, the small supply of food and the men's guns.

XX US Corps, consisting of the 6th and 10th Infantry Divisions (Light) and 43rd Infantry Division (US Army Reserve) and various artillery, engineer and support units, has been pushed back into the Black Forest by the Italian Alpini of 4th Corps. Italian troops have cut the American corps off, although they are unable to make much forward progress in the dark and rough wooded terrain.

Specialist Cutler is beaten by his Soviet counterparts and forced to take them to the cellar where he was hiding throughout the battle. The motor-riflemen take the remaining supplies and Cutler's rucksack, sleeping bag and other personal gear and other items of value from the building, then turn him over to the rear detachment for processing as a prisoner of war.

RCAF CF-18s appear in the skies overhead, operating from their new location at the Dortmund civilian airport. American F/A-18s of the Warlords of VMFA-451, assigned to support II MEF, score a lucrative air-to-air kill when a flight of four fighter-bombers races east, intercepting and shooting down a Soviet AN-26RT ELINT aircraft that was loitering over Poland collecting intelligence on NATO positions along the Oder River.

[chico20854]

June 7, 1998

The reinforcements, aircraft, armored vehicles and ammunition that arrived in the convoy in May allow US forces in Kenya, who had been short of
supplies, to resume offensive operations against the Somalis and Sudanese in the north.

Unofficially,

The lieutenant governor of Tennessee receives word from federal authorities that, due to the strategic importance of the bridges over the Mississippi River and other transportation links, the federal government is willing to commit resources to bolster state defense forces to secure the city of Memphis. The 2nd Regiment, Tennessee State Guard, which is occupying a series of roadblocks and refugee camps along the Interstate 40 corridor between Nashville and Memphis, is identified as the nearest and most readily available unit.

The violence over the border continues, with a bloody dawn massacre of Mexican refugees by renegade state guardsmen of the 1st Texas Brigade.

In Mexico City, there is heavy military traffic throughout the city as midnight approaches.

The Soviet 16th Army continues its pursuit of the retreating VII US Corps, with the 19th and 20th Guards Tank Divisions augmented by the 57th GMRD's 51st Guards Tank Regiment advancing slowly towards the town of Uffenheim, defended by the American 1st Infantry Division.

[chico20854]

June 8, 1998

A PRI-PPS alliance seizes power in Mexico. It immediately issues secret orders for an invasion of the U.S.

The replica USS Constitution picks up American POWs from a wrecked Bulgarian freighter.

Unofficially,

The commanders of the Presidential Guard Brigade and Brigada Ciudad Mexico are replaced by PRI loyalist lieutenant colonels and by nightfall the armed standoff in the streets of the capital has ended as the new regime displays a firm hand.

Specialist Cutler is loaded aboard a KAMAZ supply truck alongside other American POWs (along with a pair of German Territorial Army deserters that had been swept up in Ansbach) for evacuation from the combat zone.

Bundeswehr intelligence analysts note that many recently arrived Soviet conscripts are equipped with non-standard body armor, some dating to the 1950s, others wearing bulletproof vests designed for MVD police use. Soviet troops are also appearing at the front wearing Second World War SSh-39 helmets, phased out of production in 1942.

The Hungarian 53rd Mechanized Brigade, having paused for several weeks gathering food and fuel, resumes its westward journey. The brigade reconnaissance company sends out several patrols to the Krasnoyarsk area, seeking a useable and lightly defended bridge over the Yenesei River.

[chico20854]

June 9, 1998

Nothing in canon for the day. Unofficially,

Mexican units rush towards the border as the Mexican Army establishes command and control structures for the invasion of the US: 2nd Army is responsible for operations west of the Sierra Madre Occidental, 3rd Army for operations in New Mexico and west Texas and 4th Army for operations in eastern and central Texas. American intelligence agents in the border region, mainly from the Drug Enforcement Agency, have been inactive for some months and in any case would be unable to relay news of the troop movements to the Joint Chiefs, such is the state of both communications and command and control within the US government at this stage. The DIA station chief in Mexico City was killed in anti-American rioting earlier in the year and has not been replaced; the three-man CIA team in the capital is absorbed with trying to determine who holds the reins of power, investigating rumors that the PPS-PRI alliance may have the support of narcotrafficers. The CIA team attributes the sudden disappearance of Mexican Army APCs and troops to their returning to barracks, not noticing that the 1st and 2nd Mechanized Brigades are in fact loading onto railcars on the city's outskirts, or that the parachute brigade is moving to the international airport, where a stream of transports is arriving.

The Soviet 41st Army receives a trainload of reinforcements from the USSR. It includes another two dozen T-34 tanks from deep storage near the Urals, which are assigned to the 62nd Tank Division, partially replacing the heavy losses it sustained in the capture of Erbach an der Donau. The train from home also brings fresh replacement troops, over 200 young men from Uzbekistan, some of whom even speak Russian.

The commander of the John F Kennedy battle group, deeming the Soviet air threat greatly diminished, detaches the cruiser USS Gettysburg to conduct an anti-surface sweep through the Ionian Sea and islands, responding to rumors of enemy naval and merchant traffic through the Corinth Canal. The remainder of the battle group continues to patrol the central Mediterranean at low speed to conserve fuel, maintaining a single aircraft aloft during daylight hours with additional planes on deck, armed and ready to respond to any enemy activity.

[chico20854]

June 10, 1998

Another day with nothing official. Unofficially,

The Mexican troop movements continue; the mechanized and motorized units relying the rail network to move their vehicles, while infantry units make use of requisitioned civilian trucks and buses. The many months of fuel rationing hampers this effort, as the civilian sector has been largely fuel starved, leaving many theoretically available vehicles inoperable from disuse and lacking drivers.

The Canadian military effort against the secessionist Quebecois has largely halted. A French aid convoy is reportedly en route, but the primary reason is the inability of the Canadian Army to continue the offensive with an assault crossing of the St. Lawrence River. Its few combat engineers lack bridging equipment or boats sufficient to cross the over 2-mile wide river.

RainbowSix reports that the western part of Cornwall begins to receive refugees from chaotic conditions elsewhere in the UK. Some of them meet Marcus Rose, a former Major in the Parachute Regiment, who offers them self-defense training.

Specialist Cutler and the other POWs captured in Ansbach, Germany are transferred to a boxcar for further evacuation. At nightfall the train heads east, taking the roundabout route through Austria, Hungary and Czechoslovakia to the USSR.

[chico20854]

June 11, 2998

The replica USS Constitution calls in Porta Delgado, Azores.

Lead elements of the Mexican Army cross the border in force along five major axes - from Tijuana into San Diego, into California's Imperial Valley, into Arizona south of Tucson, against El Paso for a drive on Albuquerque, New Mexico, and on a broad front along the Rio Grande in Texas.

[The following is a mix of canon and unofficial material]

The California assault is carried out by the 2nd Army, which sends the Ensenada Brigade across the border, overrunning the startled Border Patrol agents and squad of California State Guardsmen on duty at the busy San Ysidro border crossing point. Within an hour they have overrun the border post and the nearby Naval Outlying Landing Field Imperial Beach and by sunset they have covered most of the 14 miles between the border and the city of San Diego.

The Mexican 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment crosses the border overland a few miles to the east, while in the predawn hours the Marine Parachute Regiment lands (the first two companies by parachute, the last two later in the day air-landed) on Naval Air Station Miramar. They overcome the USN security troops, mechanics, pilots and technicians stationed there, destroy the few remaining aircraft that are based there and seizing the remaining fuel supplies before they can be destroyed. The 1st Mechanized Brigade remains in reserve to exploit any breakthroughs or reinforce any units that need it.

In the central sector of the 2nd Army sector, Brigade Mexicali crosses the border at Calexico and overruns the USMC air station at El Centro. When the truck-borne infantry catches up with the brigade's 18th Motorized Cavalry Regiment at the air station the cavalry once again leaps forward, capturing the parched fields of the Imperial Valley. The Nogales Brigade crosses into Arizona, sending mechanized detachments north along Interstate 19 towards Tucson while deploying flank security detachments to protect its right flank from the 111th Military Intelligence Brigade at Ft. Huachuca.

Throughout the 2nd Army sector the advance is assisted by local guides, local ethnic-Mexican criminal gangs, some of which defended Mexican refugee camps and others allied with the narcotrafficing gangs that have operated in the region for years. Handsomely rewarded drug lords have made an arrangement with the PPS-PRI alliance in Mexico City to assist in the invasion in exchange for the right to "repatriate" the wealth of the captured territory.

In West Texas the 3rd Army crosses the Rio Grande. The Ciudad Juarez Brigade invades El Paso, pushing through the crowded built up area to try to capture Fort Bliss in a coup-de-main. The Torres Motorized Cavalry Brigade advances to the west, moving cautiously up Interstate 10 to try to surround the base from the northwest. It only advances a mile and a half when it encounters the first ambush by state guardsmen of the 9th Texas Brigade, losing a French-built VBL armored car. The ambush is quickly suppressed with some heavy weapons fire and the use of a Milan anti-tank missile, but the cavalry's momentum has been broken by the soldiers' desire to avoid more ambushes, three of which are encountered in the next two miles. The Chihuahua Brigade crosses the Rio Grande nearly 200 miles to the southeast, at the Presidio, Texas border crossing. Largely unopposed, the brigade advances up Highway 67 towards Odessa, commandeering civilian vehicles to enhance its mobility.

The 4th Army invades on a broad front further east in Texas. The Monterrey Brigade crosses the border at Laredo, immediately encountering the state guardsmen of the 1st Texas Brigade, who just days earlier were massacring unarmed Mexican civilians. The 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment remains on the Mexican side of the border, ready to lunge forward up Interstate 35 towards San Antonio and Austin once the infantry clear the Texan blocking force. To the west, the Monclova Brigade crosses the Rio Grand at Eagle Pass, where much of the unit turns northwest to face the combined might of the 3rd Texas Regiment and the trainees of the USF basic training wing at Laughlin AFB.

The fiercest resistance comes along the Gulf Coast, where the Matamoros Brigade and 2nd Mechanized Brigade cross into Brownsville and McAllen, respectively. Brownsville is garrisoned by the sailors of the USS Makin Pre-Commissioning Unit. The mechanized troops' advance to highway 77 is stalled by resistance from the cadets and cadre of the Marine Military Academy, a private military school in Harlingen, who are fiercely defending their campus and blocking traffic on the highway.

Unofficially,

The Mexican Air Force operates in the skies overhead. The sole fighter squadron, the 401st, with eight flyable F-5 aircraft, supports 4th Army's ground troops with rocket and gunfire as well as bombing fixed emplacements, to little effect overall. The 402nd Squadron, operating in the west, flies close support missions assisting the paratroops at Miramar with its ancient T-33 trainers, while 3rd Army is nominally supported by several squadrons of turboprop PC-7 armed trainers, which struggle to avoid the heavy anti-aircraft defenses of Fort Bliss, home to the US Army Air Defense Center and School.

In all sectors, the American response is weak and uncoordinated. Almost uniformly they are surprised by the arrival of Mexican units and out of position to mount a coherent defense. The troops are poorly supplied - those on civil relief and internal security missions have but a single magazine of ammunition, many Navy and Air Force training units only have enough small arms for a third of their troops, food and fuel are scarce and combat units are in most cases awaiting deployment overseas, with vague promises that heavy weapons and equipment will be provided in theatre. The Mexicans have achieved strategic and tactical surprise, leaving the Joint Chiefs struggling to form a response.

In Germany, having had two days to integrate the reinforcements and replacements, the 62nd Tank Division is ordered back into action as 41st Army attempts to surround (rather than overrun) the city of Stuttgart.

The USS Virginia crosses into the Pacific Ocean, braving fierce winter storms in the treacherous waters of Cape Horn. Despite the potential shelter of the channels to the north in Tierra del Fuego the cruiser's captain decides to remain offshore, unwilling to risk his ship in constrained waters where it would be vulnerable to attack or interdiction from ashore.

[chico20854]

June 12, 1998

Nothing official for the day. Unofficially,

Throughout the world, nearly all of the carefully husbanded reserve stockpiles assembled so carefully and at great expense in the months and years leading up to the nuclear exchange have been emptied. Even the most ambitious plans were for at most 90 days of supplies of food, fuel and strategic materials; by this point it has been nearly a year since the first nuclear weapons were used and over seven months since the attacks on the Soviet, British and American homelands. Most of the few remaining stockpiles are intact because they have been lost or because various small groups are maintaining tight control over their contents, usually for nefarious purposes.

Ex-corporal Nathan Snyder, now a marauder in New York City's Hells Own gang, leads a group of six other gang members (including his girlfriend, the gang leader's younger sister) in an attack on an isolated New York State Guard outpost. The attack succeeds in killing three guardsmen and driving the others off, yielding the dead militiamen's M1 Garand rifles and ammunition, steel helmets and a cache of food and a TA-1 field phone.

2nd Mexican Army's assault on California continues, with Brigade Ensenada reaching the San Diego Naval Base's southern perimeter, which has been hastily reinforced by armed sailors from the San Diego Recruit Training Command. The Mexican Air Force flies six additional companies of paratroops in Miramar Naval Air Station; the growing airborne force aggressively pushes combat patrols out in all directions. One of these patrols, which has set up ambush positions along Interstate 15, intercepts a USMC convoy headed into the city. The convoy of trucks carries over 100 tons of ammunition from the range complex at Camp Pendleton, ordered hastily loaded by recruits training at the rifle ranges and rushed to arm the recruits training at MCRD San Diego. The trailing 5-ton truck, commanded by an aggressive Corporal who lost an eye during 1st MarDiv's evacuation of Yadz and manned by three privates, escapes the ambush and takes back roads onto the base, bringing nearly 300,000 rounds of 5.56 ball ammo to the the defenders. The truck, however, does not carry any grenades, anti-tank weapons, linked ammo for machineguns or SAWs, mines or grenade launcher ammunition.

The Mexican 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment has reached Interstate 8, blocking what little traffic the limited fuel supply permits. The Mexicali Brigade's cavalry regiment continues northward, with lead elements arriving in Palm Springs, while its 8th and 78th Infantry Regiments turn east to deal with the American forces at MCAS Yuma and the garrison of the National Training center at the Yuma Proving Ground.

The Nogales Brigade's advance on Tucson continues, facing light resistance from scattered law enforcement officers, armed civilians and veterans, while warily watching its eastern flank lest the 111th Military Intelligence Brigade emerge from its garrison at Fort Huachuca.

The fighting in El Paso continues, with the Ciudad Juarez Brigade's troops maneuvering room limited by the desire to avoid the blast damage zone from the Soviet strike on the El Paso refinery in December. The limitation provides the garrison commander time to reinforce the basic training companies from the base with anti-aircraft weapons systems from the Air Defense Center and School; the Diana systems' 25mm guns and the 20mm PIVADs provide massive direct firepower to the otherwise lightly equipped infantry. The Torres Motorized Cavalry Brigade is still tied up with the Texas State Guard's 9th Brigade, which has retreated to high ground dominating the northern exits to the city.

The remote town of Marfa, Texas falls to the Chihuahua Brigade's 10th Motorized Cavalry Regiment; the 20th Motorized Cavalry Regiment is closing on the town while the horsemen of the 30th Cavalry Regiment provide screening for the brigade's three battalions of infantry, who are advancing on foot through the scorching desert heat.

Further east in Texas, the Monclova Brigade, reinforced by informal militias from refugee camps at the Eagle Pass Auxiliary Airfield and Laughlin Air Force Base's auxiliary field, wheels northwest along Highway 277 to move on Del Rio and its garrison of Texas State Guardsmen and the trainees and staff at the USAF basic training center at Laughlin.

The 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment drives the 1st Texas Brigade out of the town of Laredo, inflicting heavy casualties on the Texans who have no means of halting the Mexican armored vehicles. The 2nd Mechanized Brigade has hit a roadblock when trying to advance through Harlingen, with unexpectedly fierce resistance from the cadets of the Marine Military Academy, who have fortified their campus over the preceding months. An advanced detachment's DN-V Toro armored personnel carrier falls victim to an improvised anti-tank mine, and the Mexican attempt to rescue the crew is thwarted by cadet machinegun fire. The brigade's commanding general (the Mexican Army, with more than 500 generals, has generals commanding brigades) orders a halt to forward progress while the situation can be evaluated. The Matamoros Brigade has linked up with the remaining inhabitants of the largest two refugee camps in Brownsville and cleared out several outposts of sailors from the Makin Island. At dusk the brigade's troops have the five-story high partially completed amphibious assault ship, still on land at the shipyard, in sight and place it under harassing fire.

The skies over the southwestern US are a little more active. The Mexican 401 Squadron's F-5Es fly photoreconnaissance missions at dawn, overflying sites as far north as the outskirts of Dallas, and after lunchtime fly a second sortie in support of 4th Army, striking runways and barracks at Laughlin Air Force Base. The 6th Air Defense Artillery Brigade commander at Fort Bliss authorizes the use of all anti-aircraft missiles on base against the PC-7 turboprop light attack aircraft that are harassing movement on the base; the shootdown of one of the aircraft two hours later by a Patriot missile marks the low point on the value of missile-to-target tradeoff but succeeds in convincing the Mexican pilots to be much more conservative in their behavior over the lines. 402 Squadron's aged T-33 trainers spend the day scouting for reinforcements headed for the San Diego area, attacking some Marines at Camp Pendleton and strafing the flight lines at NAS North Island and Camp Pendleton. American aircraft make their first appearance over the battlefield, with a flight of four AT-38 trainers from Holloman Air Force Base's 433rd Tactical Fighter Training Squadron dropping 250-lb bombs on the Torres Cavalry Brigade, a mission guided by spotters with the Texas State Guard. The mission is partially successful, but one of the trainers was nearly downed by an American Roland missile fired by an enthusiastic gunner at Fort Bliss which mistook the fast, low-flying fighter for a Mexican F-5.

In Colorado Springs, the Joint Chiefs struggle to get a clear picture of the situation. Communications with the combat zone are spotty at best and no remaining national-level intelligence collection assets (satellites, aircraft) are oriented towards the border. The units of the strategic reserve are fully committed to domestic duties and shortages of fuel limit the options for response. By the end of the day the first centrally-directed assets are preparing for movement towards the combat zone, as the 388th Tactical Fighter Wing at Hill AFB, Utah arms and prepares two flights of F-16s for transfer to Tinker AFB, Oklahoma. A courier is dispatched by light plane (a USAF Academy Cessna T-41 trainer) to Fort Irwin, California with orders for the 177th Armored Brigade and 1st Brigade, 4th Armored Division to move south to contain the invasion.

Naval commanders in San Diego use the array of harbor craft to ferry civilians, dependents and non-combatant personnel from the naval base to the Marine Corps base, returning with armed boot camp graduates who are rushed to the base perimeter or to throw up blocking positions on the narrow spit of land south of the Coronado Naval Base.

Mexican naval squadrons sortie from Veracruz in the Caribbean and Acapulco in the Pacific. Each task force contains a single LST and several auxiliaries loaded with Marines for follow-on landings to support the efforts along the coastlines.

The American cruiser USS Gettysburg, operating independently in the Mediterranean, strikes a defensive mine while conducting a gunfire raid on the Greek airbase at Araxos after failing to find any Greek surface craft other than small fishing boats and other small civilian craft. The AEGIS cruiser begins to rapidly take on water, and as midnight approaches the ship settles beneath the waves.

[chico20854]

June 13, 1998

The School Brigade at Fort Bliss, which has served as served as a chain-of-command parent organization for a variety of training units assigned to the Air Defense School for training and activation, is activated as a troop unit, complete with infantry battalions out of the local basic training barracks, artillery from the New Mexico National Guard, and the 1-124 Cavalry Squadron (Texas National Guard) from Waco. The Air Defense Center naturally provides an abundance of air defense units, including a Patriot missile battalion, a battalion of composite air defense weapons, and the 5-62 ADA. The brigade uses its available mix of weapons to create unorthodox operational units. Infantry drawn from basic training camps at Fort Bliss is attached to ADA gun batteries (PIVAD and Diana) to create heavy machinegun combat teams. Because the brigade has no organic field artillery, it relies heavily on infantry mortars and develops its own doctrine for employment of ADA gun systems in the indirect fire role.

Unofficially,

Additional Mexican C-130 transports land at Miramar Naval Air Station, bringing in reinforcements to the airborne force that seized the base. Interestingly, the planes land with only a thin reserve of fuel aboard, refueling from the hydrants on the base before returning home. Upon arrival back in Mexico, the aircraft transfer most of the fuel remaining to the base's fuel system - the Mexican Air Force has started to stretch its fuel supply by using captured American stocks.

In San Diego, the frigate USS Donald B Beary is reactivated (it has been partially deactivated as the supply of fuel diminished, its crew assigned to food distribution duties ashore) and immediately engages the Mexicans with its 5-inch gun; the short-range direct-fire is devastatingly effective. Mexican troops hidden among shoreside buildings return fire, riddling the lightly-armored warship with hundreds of holes from small arms fire. When available visible targets are all engaged and the ship's magazine running down the ship withdraws a few miles north to the large shipyard, where a hastily assembled crew of workers joins the ship's company in repairing some of the damage.

Elsewhere in the Battle of San Diego, Mexican troops of the Ensenada Brigade fail in their first direct assault crossing of the Sweetwater River into the southern portion of the naval base; however the brigade has used the engagement to slip the 8th Motorized Cavalry Regiment past Navy outposts further east. The motorized cavalry sweeps deeper into the city, taking advantage of the cover provided by the dense urban buildup.

In eastern Texas, Mexican progress is slow. 401 Squadron's F-5s are diverted from close air support missions to attack grounded aircraft on the ground at Bergstrom AFB outside San Antonio, succeeding in destroying a pair of B-1Bs that have been sheltering there since December. In Brownsville the Matamoros Brigade drives the crew of the USS Makin back over 250 meters in fierce house to house fighting; one of the Americans killed is Rodney Cutler, twin brother of Specialist Randolph Cutler, who catches a sniper's bullet when running for cover. In Harlingen, the troops of the 2nd Mechanized Brigade continue to discover unpleasant surprises from the cadets of the Marine Maritime Academy when it is discovered that one of the school's alumni has provided his alma mater with weapons not authorized to any Junior ROTC units, most notably a M50 Ontos light anti-tank vehicle as well as various .50-caliber rifles to supplement the four M-60 machineguns the school cadre sweet talked a friendly logistician into providing for "educational purposes." The Ontos uses its six 106mm recoilless rifles to make quick work of a pair of AMX-13 light tanks, once again forcing the Mexican brigade to suspend follow-on attacks.

The 868th Tactical Missile Training Squadron is ordered to withdraw from its home station of Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, Arizona to Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada, in advance of advancing Mexican forces.

On New York's Upper East Side, marauder Nathan Snyder asserts himself as being the custodian of the gang's small cache of weapons and food.

The Danish Expeditionary Corps is driven out of Stuttgart by the Soviet 41st Army after Italian troops of the 3rd Corps advance on the Rhine, having severed the connection between the Danes and the now-isolated XX US Corps. IV German Korps, holding the line between the Danes and the US VII Corps, retreats to the north; German commanders have to restrain their troops from engaging in a scorched earth withdrawal, promising that they will be back soon. XII German Korps troops, brought forward from reserve near Limburg, occupy defensive positions along the Main River west of Wurzburg, control of which has been ceded by the overstretched and exhausted US VII Corps.

[chico20854]

June 14, 1998

Nothing in canon for today. Unofficially,

The challenges facing the Joint Chiefs expand dramatically today as the Soviet forces in British Columbia launch their long-feared spring offensive, using carefully husbanded stocks of supplies and ammunition which has trickled in on small ships from home over the prior several months and been laboriously transported to the front. With allied Canadian units hobbled by lack of supplies (as a result of Alberta's border closure), the main force resisting the attack is the American 47th Infantry Division. The Soviets open the attack with a trio of artillery-delivered tactical nuclear strikes which spook the front-line troops, who retreat and disperse to avoid becoming the next recipients of armageddon.

A wave of patriotism accompanies the Mexican invasion of the US and thousands of men (and more than a few women) flock to military bases around the country, eager to volunteer to fight the gringos.

As the fourth day of combat along the border begins, Mexican commanders begin to realize the challenges that an army organized for internal security and home defense duties faces when engaged in expeditionary warfare - logistics. The supplies of food, fuel and ammunition that Mexican Army units carried with them when they crossed the American border have been exhausted, and the hastily organized and mobilized brigades have no support battalions, and the respective Army headquarters are having a difficult time coordinating combat operations of units spread out over hundreds of miles, let alone organizing resupply convoys. Staffers at the Ministry of National Defense in Mexico City are pushing stocks from depots around the country north by rail, but the forward combat formations have very limited numbers of trucks (averaging a 50-truck company, with aged 2 1/2- and 5-ton trucks, all cargo variants, per Army) to try to move supplies forward from hastily organized railheads.

The Mexican Army makes little progress during the day. The fighting in San Diego continues, with Mexican units moving north through the city to link up with the paratroops at Miramar Naval Air Station and closing off escape routes for American defenders all around the harbor. In El Paso, the School Brigade and its German allied personnel turn back a dawn attack by the Ciudad Juarez Brigade, while the Torres Cavalry Brigade makes some progress moving north along the city's western outskirts. The fighting in Brownsville is bogged down by fierce resistance as well, while overhead the 388th Tactical Fighter Wing's F-16s fly their first sorties against the Mexicans.

The US Navy Landing Ship Tank Barbour County arrives in Kokura, Japan to pick up the cargo of trucks and the handful of armored vehicles that were aboard the mine-damaged Rhode Island Freedom, which has been abandoned in the Japanese city's harbor.

Advance positions of the German X Corps, manned by the (former East-German) border guards of the 7th GrenzJaeger Division, engage lead elements of the Soviet 30th Guards Motor-Rifle Division as the Soviets advance on Heidelberg. Italian mechanized troops of the Legnano Mechanized Brigade push past scattered territorial resistance in Pforzheim, rushing on the Karlsruhe on the Rhine.

To the east, V US Corps and II British Corps have taken up posiitions along the northern bank of the Main River, taking advantage of the defensive value of that major water barrier and with knowledge that Pact engineer troops are very short on assault bridging assets after the 1997 campaign. The Hungarian II Corps has occupied Bamberg; security troops go house to house searching for "collaborators" who worked for the US Army in the decades that the town hosted 3rd Brigade, 1st Armored Division. The Hungarians, however, seem most interested in obtaining control of the wealth that the Americans brought the community, and the Corps commander isssues a decree that nothing is to removed from the US Arrmy base without his express permission, pushing the looting out into the town.

The Czech 1st Army has been less successful in advancing through rough terrain north of Bayreuth, meeting continued fierce resistance from the German 24th PanzerGrenadier Division.

The remnants of the Soviet 1048th Assault Gun Regiment, a SU-130 formation that was nearly annihilated in the 1997 campaign that has been serving as the defense force for the Baltic Front commander's villa in northwestern Poland, receives unexpected reinforcements - a detachment of 20 Second World War-era ISU-152 heavy assault guns, dropped off from tank transporters along with 125 teenagers from Estonia armed with AKMs and a few truckloads of ammunition and fuel for the behemoths.

The American aircraft carrier USS John F Kennedy is damaged by an Italian mine in the Mediterranean. This is the second time the ship has sustained serious damage, having been hit by a Soviet mine in the first days of the war. This blast renders one of the ship's four propeller shafts inoperable. Nonetheless, the carrier and its remaining escorts move into the Adriatic Sea in an effort to hamper Italian supply shipments along the coast and to its occupation forces in Jugoslavia.

[chico20854]

June 15, 1998

The 49th Armored Division (Texas National Guard), on civil security and relief duties in the Upper Midwest, is ordered south to halt the Mexican invasion.

Command of surviving fixed-wing elements of the US Navy and the US Marine Corps 1st Marine Air Wing is transferred to USAFCENT (9th Air Force) for operational and administrative purposes. (Unofficially) Resistance to this development from Marine officers, who insist that 1 MAW should continue to be dedicated to supporting I MEF, is overruled by General McLaren, who declares the situation too serious for Marine commanders to hoard such scarce assets and rightfully points out that the move allows the most efficient use of the remaining combat aircraft.

Unofficially,

The 47th Infantry Division gives ground in British Columbia, trying to delay as long as possible to give local civilians time to evacuate.

In Colorado Springs, the FEMA laison officer to the Joint Chiefs passes away due to complications of the bubonic plague. He is the last FEMA official still serving that had knowledge of the Strategic Reserve Stockpile system assembled at great expense in the prior two years; his deputy, who has assumed his responsibilities, never was cleared to be briefed on the program. This development assures that the Joint Chiefs are unaware of the vital assets that could be used to assist American recovery.

The Joint Chiefs order the evacuation of nuclear weapons from Texas south of San Antonio and California south of Bakersfield.

The US Navy begins evacuating non-combatants and civilians from San Diego as overland ties to the rest of California are cut. The evacuation effort makes use of the vast numbers of harbor service craft, excess support ships stranded in port from lack of fuel and ships in or awaiting repair that are still seaworthy. The Marines holding the perimeter (which have largely replaced the sailors facing Brigade Ensenada) repel another Mexican attack, although they lack armored vehicles, heavy weapons or even machinegun ammunition to try to break the 1st Mechanized Brigade's blockade of the harbor area. Mexican cavalry troops and paratroops begin tentative probes north into Camp Pendelton.

To the east, the Mexicali Brigade has established a series of blocking positions along Interstate 8 to, hopefully, slow any advance of the 108th Armored Cavalry Regiment and 223rd Armored Regiment (the OPFOR for the Yuma Proving Ground's National Training Center), should those units attempt to cut off the lone Mexican brigade.

The Battle of Fort Bliss continues, with repeated attacks on the garrison while the Mexican Torres Mororized Cavalry Brigade issucceeding in suppressing the Texas State Guard's 9th Brigade, advancing to the northern outskirts of El Paso. Back in Mexico, the Durango and Torreon Brigades are ordered to reinforce the effort; they begin preparing their cavalry regiments for immediate deployment while transport is arranged for the infantry. To the east, the Chihuahua Brigade has dramatically increased its mobility through requisitioning civilian vehicles and stocks of fuel stored on various ranches and oil wells. Given the desperate situation in El Paso and near-total lack of coordinated resistance (after overrunning the border patrol stations the brigade has only faced at most 10 armed civilians and no armed troops), 3rd Army orders the brigade to rush north to Pecos, then turn northwest to execute a double envelopment of the American force at Fort Bliss (and the base's extensive back country that runs into White Sands Missile Range and Holloman AFB).

The Nogales Brigade in Arizona has slowed its advance on Tucson, wary of its deep exposure on both flanks and shortages of fuel. Advance parties have Tucson in sight, but the main body remains farther south lest it be cut off by troops from Ft. Huachuca.

In central Texas the Monclova Brigade turns northeast after having smashed the Aggies of the 3rd Texas Regiment (part of the former Texas A&M Cadet Corps) and overrun Laughlin Air Force Base and its training squadrons. The Monterrey Brigade and 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment continue their advance up Interstate 35 towards San Antonio, slowed by low fuel supplies. To their east the battle for Brownsville is seeing Mexican progress, with the partially-completed hull of the USS Makin island now ablaze after mutliple hits by Mexican heavy weapons; the sailors' resistance begins to wane as ammunition and food runs low and the commander has authorized the evacuation of nonessential personnel to small and civilian craft operating in the Intracoastal Waterway. In Harlingen, the Mexican 2nd Mechanized Brigade has fought its way onto the campus of the Marine Military Academy, taking advanbtage of the massed artillery (as it happens to be) of 4th Army.

The managers of Lone Star Oil, a small oil company that is still operating a handful of rigs in the Gulf of Mexico, order the shutdown and evacuation of their platforms south of Corpus Christi, including Gulfwind 40 and Gulfwind 42.

map of front lines (https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1Hc5hJn8gkc85J4BJtz3QKNKpWmeX_xm_&usp=sharing)
The Soviet 21st Army launches another spoiling attack on the US XV Corps, ensuring that the unit diverts scarce ammunition, fuel and air support from other units farther to the west. The Soviet troops, however, do not press their attacks and have not, in fact, even overrun the American outpost line to reach the main line of resistance.

After five days of stop and start travel in a crowded and claustrophobic boxcar, during which ten prisoners die, Specialist Cutler and his fellow prisoners are unloaded at a remote siding in eastern Czechoslovakia. They are greeted by Czech SNB internal troops and Czecch militiamen, who begin marching the dazed prisoners (they were served two meals during their journey) along the tracks.

STAVKA realizes that the veteran 27th (my 90th) Tank Division is still stuck in eastern Siberia, en route to the European theatre, and directs that local and regional Party authorities make the division's passage to the front "highest priotiry". The decree is sufficient to compel authorities in the Krasnoyarsk region to release six heavy-duty LV steam locomotives, each with 225 tons of coal to propel the division (and its thousands of hungry, armed troops) far across the USSR.

[chico20854]

June 16, 1998

As the struggle in Germany consumes more and more troops and supplies, Italian and Hungarian formations in the Balkans are starved of replacements, and the Pact high command issues calls for excess troops from the region to be transferred to the fighting in Germany.

Major General Helmut Korell, commander of the 1st Panzer Division, assumes de-facto command of II German Korps.

Unofficially,

The US Army puts a formal command structure in place in the Southwest, with 89th (my II )Corps headquarters (located east of Los Angeles coordinating disaster relief duties) taking command of units at Fort Irwin and Yuma Proving Ground as well as other US military ground forces in the area and 63rd (my XVI) Corps, in the Bay area, ordered to move south along with troops from Forts Ord and Hunter Liggett and Camp Roberts to operate along the coast. In Texas, 90th (my XIII) and 122nd (my XIX) Corps are assigned to command the scratch forces opposing the Mexican 4th Army.

SOUTHCOM issues orders for diversionary strikes on Mexico via Guatemala. A B-team from the 8th Special Forces Group departs its base at Soto Cano air base in Honduras, en route to Chiapas, Mexico to "stir up some trouble" and divert Mexican forces from the American front. SOUTHCOM also dispatches attack aircraft to Soto Cano, six AT-33E Boeing Skyfoxes, for a strike on Mexican territory.

The 868th Tactical Missile Training Squadron arrives at Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada, with all 48 GLCM missiles intact and mission ready.

The Mexican high command empowers a new coordinator for the logistics effort supporting the war - the former chief logistics officer of a large American retailer, now (like most worldwide retailing) out of business. The new coordinator quickly seizes on the possibilities of using the vast fleet of commercial long-haul trucks and drivers, used to regularly crossing the border. Orders are quickly issued to mobilize the drivers and their vehicles to establish a relay from railheads in Hermosillo, Chihuahua City, Monterrey and Matamoros.

The 177th Armored Brigade departs Fort Irwin, California to halt the Mexican invasion. The brigade's VISMOD (Visually Modified) M551 Sheridans have, in many cases, been returned to combat-capable status, although the supply of Shillelagh missiles and main gun ammunition is short. Thankfully, however, the issues the Sheridan experienced in combat in Vietnam with the gun's recoil disabling the missile's guidance electronics, have been long resolved, allowing the system to be somewhat effective. (Commanders consider the Sheridan more than adequate to deal with the Mexican Army's armor). The 1st Brigade, 4th Armored Division will follow the 177th when the tank transporters return from moving the 177th to the vicinity of the desert town of Yucca Valley.

Mexican Marines land on South Padre Island and begin advancing on the Queen Isabela Causeway to the mainland, detaching a company of troops to assault the Coast Guard station and lighthouse at Brazos Santiago.

photo (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1gtDzK9aHdhLfvdPSwXQKZ_1Yb_-_qq7-/view?usp=sharing)
The evacuation of San Diego continues as a force of Marine trainees and their drill instructors attempt to break through the Mexican lines to link up with the ad-hoc Marine force defending Camp Pendleton. The attempt is thwarted by elite Mexican paratroops and marines who exploit their superior firepower to keep the American force from advancing. Mexican Marines land on Coronado Island and begin driving north, pushing back the defending Marines and sailors; the Mexican naval task force beats a rapid retreat lest it be engaged by the superior American fleet departing the harbor.

The Mexican 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment has advanced along Interstate 15 to Temecula, part of the Inland Empire and considered the outer edge of the Los Angeles metropolitan area.

The first evacuation vessels arrive at Port Hueneme, California; the harbor master directs the smaller craft to the nearby yacht marina to keep berth space open for larger vessels.

In Yuma, Arizona, the 108th Armored Cavalry Regiment headquarters issues an order for the unit's troops, scattered over 100 miles of territory protecting evacuee camps, distributing food and assisting local law enforcement, to abandon those duties and rally at the NTC-3 for combat actions.

In the vast stretches of empty desert between Yuma, Arizona and El Paso, Texas, the invading Mexican forces remain immobile for a second day as supplies of food, water and fuel run low. Mexican Army scavenging parties roam El Paso in search of food and fuel; commanders and NCOs have to exert strict control over their troops to prevent the parties from becoming looters.

The Chihuahua Brigade departs the town of Pecos, Texas, advancing against minimal resistance up the west bank of the Pecos River towards Artesia, New Mexico, reaching the state line at sundown.

American resistance in the Brownsville area is crumbling as the remaining sailors of the USS Makin Island begin to surrender, their ammunition, food, water and will to fight exhausted and Mexican marines cross to Port Isabel from South Padre Island. To their west, the 2nd Mechanized Brigade's AMX-13 light tanks and the massed artillery of 4th Mexican Army pound the campus of the Marine Military Academy into dust, destroying many of the defensive positions with direct fire while lighting the buildings afire. In central Texas, the lead patrols of the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment clash with mobile American detachments, primarily HMMWVs mounting machineguns and Mk-19 grenade launchers, while the Monclova Brigade troops secure the shotgun factory in Eagle Pass, taking many of the guns for their own use and sending thousands of others south to equip newly forming units.

The 2nd Regiment, Tennessee State Guard is reinforced with federal resources - 200 sailors previously assigned to the Memphis Naval Air Station as well as a complement of small arms (M1 Garands, M3 greaseguns, M1911 pistols and M1919 Browning machineguns), 90mm recoilless rifles and ammunition, which arrive by truck from the Anniston Army Depot in Alabama. The Regiment is tasked to assemble excess fuel trucks (with fuel rationing in effect, not a difficult task) at the Memphis Refinery, which has received a shipment of five barge-loads of crude oil from Oklahoma to process.

Specialist Cutler and several dozen other prisoners arrive at a work site along the railroad in the hills of eastern Czechoslovakia. They are shaved, hosed off, fed a meal of thin stew and introduced to the camp commandant and his staff, then ushered to an equipment shed, which has been converted to housing for the prisoner labor force. At dusk the shift of workers that has been toiling all day arrives, a motley collection of prisoners from all over NATO, exhausted from a hard day's labor. The new arrivals discover that they are going to be put to work restoring the rail line between Czechoslovakia and Poland, which was damaged by NATO conventional bombing as well as an American nuclear strike which left a massive crater in the railbed.

A firefight breaks out in Bamberg between Hungarian troops and a KGB Border Guard "rear area security detachment" that passes through town, seeking to "conduct an inspection of the American Army base." When the KGB troops are denied access (yet can see consumer goods being loaded onto a truck in the caserne) tensions rise, and for 30 minutes it is an intense battle between Pact allies.

In the area between Heidelberg and Frankfurt, American and German support troops and hastily drafted civilians are hurriedly evacuating maintenance and medical facilities which have supported the war effort to date, unsure of the ability of German troops to hold back the Pact offensive which has already captured thousands of square kilometers of southern Germany.

[chico20854]

June 17, 1998

It is obvious to Major General Femerov, commander of the Soviet troops in Cuba, that Guantanamo II (the enclave at Mariel in which the Cuban government has confined Soviet troops in Cuba, nearly a division in strength) presents a very tempting target for the U.S. This fact, combined with pressure from a Cuban government anxious to appear increasingly neutral to America, causes Femerov to look for a means to get out of Cuba while striking a blow for the USSR. The opportunity to deliver a blow into America comes from the Marxist PRI/PPS coalition in Mexico. The PPS offers Femerov and his ""Division Cuba"" a passage off of the island and back to the USSR, in return for a short detour. Femerov and his soldiers are to assist
in the invasion of America, to drive into the Yankee heartland, and end the war.

At the Marine Military Academy campus in Harlingen, Texas, the stubborn, last-ditch stand of the Academy students in the face of overwhelming numbers comes to an end. There are no known American survivors of the battle, which will compared to Travis' stand at the Alamo. The final pockets of resistance are shattered by a terrific artillery barrage before being overrun by Mexican infantry of the Matamoros and 2nd Mechanized Brigades.

Unofficially,

On New York's Upper East Side, there is turmoil within the Hells Own marauder gang. One of the gangsters gets in a verbal argument with ex-Corporal Nathan Snyder, who then refuses to allow the member to collect his allocation of food (a bag of stale potato chips and can of chicken soup taken from a local salvager as "tax") for the evening. The gangster calls Snyder out, and in the brawl that follows Snyder and his girlfriend end up killing the upstart and injuring his best friend in the gang. There are few challenges to Snyder's control of the food from then on, and other gang members treat Snyder and "his old lady" with more respect, although it s unclear if that respect is out of admiration or fear.

The 347th Strategic Missile Squadron, operating on the Nellis Air Force Base range complex, observes the 868th Tactical Missile Training Squadron's dispersal near its stationary sites and makes contact.

The B-Team from the 8th Special Forces Group, travelling in a small convoy of unmarked civilian vans and trucks, crosses the border into Guatemala. The liberal application of cash and the grim looks on the faces of the rough, heavily armed men assures a welcome entry into Mexico's southern neighbor. At Sato Cano Air Base a C-130 arrives carrying ground crew, support equipment and a small stock of munitions to support the AT-33E Skyfoxes that arrived the day prior.

The troops of the Chihuahua Brigade encounter their first organized resistance, an entrenched infantry force blocking the highway into the town of Carlsbad. The outer pickets fall back when Mexican armor attacks under cover of infantry mortars; the dead left behind wear uniform patches from a military academy in the town.

American F-5Es from the 65th Aggressor Squadron, using some of the last stocks of aviation fuel at Nellis Air Force Base, launch a surprise raid on Mexican airfields. The defenders, believing the aircraft are in fact Mexican F-5s, hold their fire as a pair of fighters, with another pair trailing, approach the runway at Santa Lucia near Mexico City. The fighters come in low and slow, placing them in prime position to release the stick of runway-busting munitions that they soon release before hitting their afterburners and zipping away, leaving the pattern clear for the second pair to finish off the other runway.

As the fighting in San Diego continues, Mexican Marines advance on the Coronado Amphibious base. As they enter the perimeter, the captain of the landing ship USS Cleveland orders his crew to set the ship, damaged in the prior year's naval battles and unable to be repaired rapidly enough to be evacuated, afire. The few remaining munitions in the ship's magazine are used to set a large mine, which is detonated as the Mexican troops approach the dock.

In the desert east of LA, the 177th Armored Brigade disembarks from the motley collection of civilian trucks and military tank transporters that has brought it to the north end of the Imperial Valley.

The Mexican 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment cautiously moves north, scouting for organized American resistance but is mostly encountering desperate refugees from the strikes and chaos of Los Angeles.

The opposition encountered by the troops of the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment are identified as members of the US Air Force, trainees and cadre from the Security Police training program at Lackland Air Force Base near San Antonio acting in a mobile role while basic trainees (and graduates from the prior months, who have remained at the base thanks to the breakdown in transportation, performing relief and security duties) man fixed defensive positions.

The Mexican Marines in the Gulf of Mexico complete their disembarkation from the array of naval craft onto South Padre Island as the fleet is engaged by patrol craft from the USCG, now under naval command. The USS Steelhead is sunk by the Mexican destroyer Vincente Guerrero while the USS Point Nowell rakes the Mexican transport Manzanillo with 20mm fire before turning and fleeing north at high speed, dropping to 8 knots when out of range of the Vincente Guerrero's guns to conserve the last gallons of diesel aboard, allowing it to reach a friendly port.

In the early morning hours Specialist Cutler and his fellow new arrivals at the remote POW camp in eastern Czechoslovakia are roused to begin their first brutal 12-hour shift filling in a 100-meter wide, 49-meter deep crater (created by a 150-kiloton Ground Launched Cruise Missile ground burst) with their bare hands, a handful of shovels and no protection from residual radiation. At the end of the day the exhausted prisoners eat a meal of potato-barley stew before collapsing into a deep slumber.

XX US Corps, cut off from the remainder of NATO forces in Germany, is sustained by two C-130 flights daily, which bring in food (mostly French combat rations), fuel (like the Mexican Air Force, USAF Europe uses C-130's fuel tanks for transporting fuel, draining the excess in the aircraft before departure) and ammunition and evacuate the wounded. The flow is insufficient to maintain stock levels, but it helps morale and helps keep supply levels from dropping to critical levels. Aiding the situation is that the opposing Italian 4th Corps is equally starved of supplies, most of what arrives via the circuitous route through northeastern Italy, Austria and overland from Munich going to support 3rd Corps' mechanized troops.

NATO forces in Central Germany have established a somewhat-continuous defensive line along the Main River from Frankfurt to Kulmbach, with a significant Soviet-held salient north of Wurzburg. Retreating Allied forces had attempted to bring any small boats they could locate with them as they withdrew, to deny their use to the Soviets for assault crossings of the river.

The A-37s of the 169th Tactical Air Support Squadron (Illinois Air National Guard) fly their first deep strike sorties in Kenya, supporting the offensive against the Sudanese. Intelligence has identified three villages as supply depots and rest areas for the Sudanese, and refugees report that the Sudanese Army has driven all the Kenyans from the town. Satisfied that no civilians will be hit, the 169th's commander authorizes a strike by a lone A-37. The Dragonfly is carrying six M47A2 white phosphorous bombs, six CBU-24B cluster canisters and two SUU-11A gun pods, each pod weighing 323 lbs and mounting a 7.62mm Minigun identical to the aircraft's fixed armament. In a single sortie the Dragonfly is able to level to the ground all but three or four of the approximately 100 huts and other small buildings that comprised the group of villages.

In its first pass, approaching the nearest village in line, the aircraft opens fire with a simultaneous two-second burst from all three Miniguns. The shattering and splintering effect of these 600 rounds on the buildings in line of fire make the village look to the pilot like "hay going through a threshing machine."

As the aircraft passes over the village it drops two cluster canisters, each weighing 718 lbs and containing 600 bomblets. The bomblets release a total of 300,000 steel shards, densely meshing in all directions at hundreds of feet per second, cracking stone, deeply pitting wood, and shattering into fragments any less sturdy or less pliable materials, all in a matter of ten seconds.

To the aircrew above, it looks like "hundreds of sparklers going off."

People are seen running from the next two villages as the Dragonfly approaches, but the pilot believes that the first village had been taken fully by surprise. The subsequent villages are struck in the same manner, and on their second pass the crew drops their phosphorous bombs. As each bomb hits, the ground structures at the explosion's epicenter collapse in a cloud of brilliant white smoke, and long trails of phosphorous shot out of the cloud and arched for hundreds of feet in the air. Wherever they land, and all along the length of their trails, the particles of phosphorous stick to buildings, trees, vegetation and anything else with which they came into contact, immediately setting it afire. When the aircraft turns for base, the entire area is in flames.

The attack has taken about three minutes.

[chico20854]

June 18, 1998

Nothing in canon for the day. Unofficially,

Fighting continues in San Diego as the ammunition supplies within the American perimeter dwindle to critically low levels. Captains of evacuation vessels refuse to return to the embattled ports, some out of fear, some because their craft are out of fuel; either way the harbor at Port Hueneme is now full of evacuation craft and the commander closes it to new arrivals, ordering them to the San Francisco Bay, the next series of harbors able to accommodate large craft.

The commanders of the 868th Tactical Missile Training Squadron and 347th Strategic Missile Squadron, having served together in prewar assignments, agree to consolidate their positions. The 868th moves into the secure area around the Desert Rock Airfield.

The lead battalions of the 49th Armored Division either hand over their areas of responsibility to state and local officials, or, unfortunately, abandon their disaster relief and internal security duties and prepare to move south and combat. The division commander inquires where his troops will be issued ammunition for their heavy weapons and armored vehicles; he authorizes the division's company armorers to remove the plates in their unit's M16A2s that prevent them from being placed on "burst" (the plates are a standard addition to National Guard M16s, semi-permanently installed for riot-control duties.)

Troops of Brigade Ciudad Juarez launch another attack on Fort Bliss, finally capturing the post MP station on the south side of the cantonment area. Far to the northeast, Brigade Chihuahua launches an infantry fixing attack on the cadets of the New Mexico Military Institute while dispatching an mechanized cavalry company with ERC-90 armored cars and infantry mounted in VAB APCs on a sweep to the east, hoping to encircle the cadets. Their attack is disrupted by a retired Korean-War veteran tanker and his two sons, who are singlehandedly defending the Highway 62 bridge over the Pecos River in his lovingly restored M24 Chaffee light tank. The Mexican advance is held up as the "old man" manning the 75mm gun destroys two ERC-90s; a duel ensues for the next three hours as the light tank dodges in and out of buildings and jockeys for firing positions to disrupt the cavalry's crossing. Eventually he runs out of ammunition and has to retreat, but has bought valuable time for the cadets to retreat to the cover of the city, where they are able to inflict heavy losses on the initial Mexican infantry incursion.

In Texas, additional Mexican reinforcements are arriving in the theatre. The Ciudad Victoria Brigade crosses into Brownsville, joining the 2nd Mechanized Brigade and the Matamoros Brigade in forming a division-sized "Coastal Column" beginning to move north towards Corpus Christi. The Saltillo Brigade crosses the Rio Grande at Roma and Pharr and quickly moves north, maintaining communications between the now-advancing "Coastal Column" and the armored drive towards San Antonio, where the Monterey Brigade has arrived and begins adding pressure to the US Air Force defense of the city. American reinforcements are less numerous, with the Governor of Texas committing his personal guard of State Guards and Texas Rangers to the city's defense.

The Joint Chiefs, facing massive shortages of fuel and ammunition worldwide, simply does not have anything available to commit to the front; the strategic reserve is, absent the 49th Armored Division and the 388th Tactical Fighter Wing, frozen in place by lack of fuel.

The F-16s of the 388th Tactical Fighter Wing launch their most devastating strike yet, an air raid on the Mexican Air Force base at Monterrey, where the remainder of Mexico's F-5 fighter force has been deployed following the disabling attacks on their home base. The F-16s catch four F-5s on the ground between missions, destroying them as well as five other aircraft when they blanket the base with cluster bombs.

Mexico is under aerial attack from the south as well, with the appearance over the town of Tapachula on the Guatemalan border of the Boeing Skyfox light attack aircraft of the 198th Tactical Fighter Squadron. The converted trainers concentrate on the Tapachula Brigade's garrison, working it over with cluster bombs and rockets. Return fire is limited to small arms and machinegun fire, with the resident unit, like most of the Mexican Army, completely lacking in air defense systems. After five minutes and several passes the brigade's cantonment area is ablaze, leaving the unit (the only one with armored vehicles in the Chiapas and Yucatan Armies) struggling to maintain its own integrity and completely incapable of providing reinforcements to the war effort in America.

After weeks of effort, John Greendeer, a member of the Ho-Chunk Nation and 1996 graduate of the University of Minnesota's engineering school, is able to bring the aged electrical turbine at the Hatfield electrical power plant back online. The 6-megawatt generator is capable of meeting the tribe's power needs in the months when the Black River is not frozen over.

The USS Barbour County arrives at the South Korean port of Pohang with a cargo of vehicles (mostly 3/4 and 5/4-ton trucks) salvaged from the mine-damaged Rhode Island Freedom, which was abandoned in the Japanese port of Kokura.

In northwestern Poland, at the urging of the Western TVD commander, the Baltic Front renews its attacks on the Marines and allied troops of II MEF. The assault is led by the three remaining SU-130s and 29 ISU-152s of the 1048th Assault Gun Regiment, with several dozen scared Estonian teenagers riding on the outside of the guns like their grandfathers in the 1940s. Most of the guns complete the road march to the departure point without breaking down and the behemoths prove remarkably resistant to the American’s LAW rocket fire and the infantry mortars that are the Marine's first line of defense. Six guns are lost breaching the defensive minefield and three more fall to TOW missiles while closing in on the embedded Marines. The surviving guns push into the American rear area, but the troops of the 3rd Guards Motor-Rifle Division, assigned to follow through on the breakthrough, remain passively in their positions.

The commander of Carrier Air Wing 10, from the damaged USS Independence, meets with his new commander, LtGen Thomas Forberg, USAF, commander USAFCENT and CG, 9th Air Force. Forberg is already familiar with the capabilities of many of the wing's aircraft, having served a combat tour aboard the USS Coral Sea during the Vietnam War as a F-4 pilot. The Navy Captain and the General discuss the training, personnel and logistic needs of the Naval Aviation squadrons, some of which can be more easily addressed than others. One of the most challenging issues is that of aviators' carrier qualifications - landing a tactical aircraft on a heaving flight deck, especially at night and bad weather, is a highly perishable skill that needs to be practiced regularly and which appears impossible with no operable carrier within thousands of miles.

[chico20854]

June 19, 1998

The remnants of the Greek government/Army (unofficially, in actuality, a cabal of leftist field-grade officers that asserted control of the military in the chaotic last weeks of 1997, in no small part due to the intervention of a KGB hit team that eliminated various rightist or centrist generals and politicians) issues a declaration directly annexing the Jugoslav republic of Macedonia.

The 106th Guards Air Assault Division is ordered to the Ryazan area from its reserve positions near Grodno, Byelorussia.

Unofficially,

In the wake of the evacuation of the military facilities in San Diego literally thousands of seamen, Marines, and Coast Guardsmen are brought to the San Francisco Bay Area. The fighting for control of the city's military bases continues, with troops from Brigade La Paz arriving on the front lines. Elsewhere in the city the population (many of which returned home over the winter, realizing life in an unpowered home may be preferable to that in a desert refugee camp) is suffering from lack of water and widespread fires that are burning unchecked. The final navy combatants and auxiliaries depart the harbor, taking minor damage from long-range Mexican small arms fire and taking the last noncombatants out of the perimeter.

East of San Diego the Mexican drive is encountering its first serious resistance as forward patrols of Brigade Mexicali clash with the 177th Armored Brigade's forward reconnaissance screen. The American commander has ordered his troops to maintain an active mobile defense while 89 (my II) Corps tries to scrape together enough ammunition and fuel for 1st Brigade, 4th Armored Division to join his command. The Mexican commander is able to begin shifting additional troops to face the Fort Irwin Contingent as Brigade Hermosillo begins arriving in the area and taking over the roadblocks on Interstate 8.

The Mexican 3rd Army, in the Battle of El Paso, is nearing a crisis. While a trickle of supplies is beginning to arrive, the School Brigade and its allied and Texas State Guard augmentees have fought Brigade Ciudad Juarez to a halt and, the Army commander, General de división Jose Gonzalez, fears that his command is vulnerable to an American counterattack if reinforcements do not arrive. (He is unaware of the dire situation on the cantonment area of Fort Bliss, where ammunition, food and fuel are all reaching critically low levels).

With Brownsville behind them, the so-called Mexican "Coastal Column" makes progress moving north, with parallel columns on highways 77 and 281 and forward detachment capturing the Kingsville Naval Air Station. The airfield is deserted, the aircraft having been flown off over a week ago and the garrison evacuated, taking everything of value along or burning what they couldn't carry. Many ranchers in the area are fleeing ahead of the Mexican Army, although others remain and defend their land. (These encounters rarely end well for the outnumbered and outgunned Texans). Some of this resistance is out of patriotism; for others it is a matter of survival, as the Mexican Army and refugees both are slaughtering their livestock at an alarming rate in order to survive.

South of San Antonio, skirmishing continues between Mexican Army and US Air Force contingents, the Mexican 4th Army rushing additional formations north as quickly as the ragtag transportation net can feed them.

RainbowSix reports that Faisel Khan, an immigrant to Leicester that in the years prior to the war had been a very successful businessman and charitable benefactor, has become the city's de-facto leader. This feat is not out of any desire to become a leader but instead the natural evolution that occurred as Leicester threatened to fall apart and descend into chaos and anarchy. Khan finds himself thrust to the forefront, bringing calm first to the Asian community and then to the city in general.

An odd truce reigns along the Rhine River between the German-Italian lines south of Heidelberg and the American-Italian lines opposite Strasbourg. The French Army has been maintaining active but low-key patrolling in the so-called "Dead Zone" opposite French territory. Those patrols are now running into Soviet-allied Italian troops; French commanders issue orders identical to those on the Italian border in southeaster France: correct relations, no assistance, and minimal cooperation, oriented towards deconfliction of space in an attempt to avoid NATO accusations of re-entering the conflict on the Pact side, which would raise the possibility of NATO nuclear retaliation.

The isolated guns of the 1048th Assault Gun Regiment are circled together in the rear of the US Marine's 6th Marine Regiment, low on fuel and ammunition, fight tank-hunting teams. The designated exploitation force that is supposed to advance through the hole in the lines the guns blasted, the 3rd Guards Motor-Rifle Division, remains largely immobile, its officers unable to motivate their troops to leave the safety of the forward trenches to advance on the American positions.

[chico20854]

June 20, 1998

In Cuba, Major General Femerov, after several days of consideration, accepts the Mexican government's offer and begins preparing his troops for movement to Texas. (Unofficially, he has no amphibious shipping but a motley collection of shipping of various types; he is hoping the Mexican offer to transport his command to the combat zone involves sufficient shipping, his Cuban "allies" unwilling to part with any of their small fleet.)

Unofficially,

The Mexican supply situation begins to improve as the hastily reorganized supply and transportation effort begins to show results; the railheads are getting organized and regular convoys of requisitioned civilian 18-wheeler trucks are being dispatched into captured territory. On the other hand, the Mexican Army's pre-war structure, emphasizing internal defense, is increasingly hampering operations as maintenance on the many disparate weapons systems and vehicles comes due. The support structure is oriented towards maintaining vehicles from permanent facilities in garrisons throughout Mexico, often with contract or civilian staff; the brigades in combat lack the necessary mechanics, tools, spares and expertise to performs maintenance above the operator level. For unarmored vehicles this shortcoming is partially rectified by seizing similar vehicles from Americans in the occupied zone, but commanders are reluctant to send lightly damaged armored vehicles hundreds of miles south for repair, opting to keep them in action until they break down completely.

The 49th Armored Division's G-4 (supply officer) informs the commander that there is insufficient fuel and heavy trucks available to convoy the entire division to Oklahoma by road. (The tracked vehicles need to be moved by truck; they are so maintenance intensive that the few vehicles that could complete the drive to Fort Sill would need an overhaul upon arrival). There is a possibility, however, to make use of the many barges and towboats tied up along the Mississippi, Ohio and Illinois Rivers to transport the division to Muskogee, Oklahoma, about 225 miles from the division's rally point at Fort Sill, via the Mississippi and Arkansas Rivers. The Commanding General approves the plan and within hours troops are seizing tugs and barges along the rivers.

The lead battalion (the 5th Battalion, 37th Armor) of the 1st Brigade, 4th Armored Division, equipped with a full complement of IPM-1 tanks (the stock maintained at the National Training Center for units rotating through), arrives on the front lines north of Palm Spring California. To its west, the scout platoons of the 40th Training Division are attempting to identify clear routes through the post-nuclear chaos of the Los Angeles basin to reach the front.

In southeastern New Mexico, the resistance offered by the cadets of the New Mexico Military Institute runs its course as ammunition supplies run out after several days of fierce urban fighting in the town of Carlsbad. At dusk, Brigade Chihuahua resumes its advance and by midnight a forward detachment has arrived in the town of Artesia.

The crisis in the 3rd Mexican Army zone is avoided when the first reinforcements from the Mexican interior arrive at the front in El Paso - the 17th Motorized Cavalry Regiment from the Torreon Brigade and the 50th Mechanized Cavalry Regiment from Brigade Durango. The cavalry's ERC-90 armored cars add much-needed firepower to Brigade Ciudad Juarez's tired and depleted infantry. As more Mexican troops (Brigade Monterrey and the 51st Infantry Regiment from Brigade Monclova) arrive on the front line south of San Antonio, the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment is withdrawn from contact with the city's American defenders and resupplied.

The Mexican Air Force has largely faded from the skies over the front following American raids on its bases and as shortages of fuel, spares and munitions begin to bite. Similar shortages also force the US Air Force to scale back its activity over the front.

The B Team from 1st Battalion, 8th Special Forces Group has completed its transit of Guatemala and crosses over into southern Mexico. A Drug Enforcement Agency field agent (a former Army Military Intelligence warrant officer) links up with the Green Berets to act as a local guide and to introduce them to some of the local indigenous leaders.

A contingent of Dutch Marines that remained with the American 2nd Marine Division score a victory against the guns of the Soviet 1048th Assault Gun Regiment, disabling the last remaining SU-130 with a well-placed Carl Gustav shot to the behemoth's engine compartment. Several other guns have been destroyed as well; in two of them the crew remains inside, continuing to fire back with small arms.

Along the front in Southern Germany, Soviet troops have paused their attacks as they await additional supplies of ammunition as well as the (likely vain) hope for replacement troops, weapons and vehicles to replace their losses in the advances to date.

Reflecting the poor condition in many navies around the world, the ammunition ship USS Mount Shasta is destroyed by a massive internal explosion while at anchor in Okinawa.

Sudanese and Somali forces in Kenya begin a general retreat under pressure from the combined forces of the 173rd Airborne Brigade, 30th Marines and Kenyan forces.

[chico20854]

June 21, 1998

The Albanian Army, always a reluctant ally, protests the Greek annexation of Macedonia.

Cape Cod is completely under UBF control. The USCG and naval commands in the area, as well as the 43rd MP Brigade, have their plates full dealing with multiple crises in other areas and are unable to take any action.

Headquarters, 63 (my XVI) Corps issues orders redesignating the 40th Training Division (less 1st Brigade) back to an infantry division, as well as ordering its reinforcement with a hodgepodge of armored vehicles. Accompanying these is a directive for it to proceed south to halt the Mexican invasion. Orders are also issued to the 221st MP Brigade to move south, and (unofficially) for the 91st Training Division to provide trained troops to the 40th and 196th Infantry Brigade to allow those units to move south; the 91st is also to assume the internal security and disaster relief duties that the 221st and 196th had been performing. The 91st, which has been training locally-drafted troops continuously since the nuclear exchange, has excess troops that are available for these duties, although weapons and vehicles are in short supply.

Unofficially,

Mexican troops of Brigade Ensenada cut off the narrow corridor between the San Diego Naval Base and the Marine Corps Recruit Depot to the northwest, taking heavy losses in the effort as Mexican Marines advance under heavy fire across the runway of the heavily burning Naval Air Station North Island, former home of the Pacific Fleet's helicopter force.

Brigade Mexicali and Brigade La Paz's 160th Infantry Regiment launch a frontal attack on 89th (my II) Corps' positions north of Palm Springs; the American armored force easily turns back the largely dismounted attack.

3rd Mexican Army pauses offensive operations for the day to allow its exhausted troops a chance to rest and to allow the rapidly evolving support organization time to resupply the widely-scattered units. The day also sees the arrival of the first infantry companies from Brigade Durango arriving in El Paso.

Farther east in Texas, a task force built around the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment and Brigade Monclova's 47th Infantry Regiment (motorized with captured vehicles) strikes out north from the former Hondo Airfield west of San Antonio, the beginning of an effort to bypass American resistance in the city. The column is attacked by an ad-ho force of Texas Rangers and armed civilians as it enters the hilly terrain, but beats the resistance back with machinegun and mortar fire. The so-called "Coastal Column" dispatches its first scouting parties into the ruins of post-nuclear Corpus Christi.

The Mexican Navy begins mobilizing a motley collection of ships and craft, dispatching them to Cuba to pick up the Soviet "Division Cuba" and its equipment.

The Soviet 2nd Southwestern Front begins planning the next wave of tis offensive, the effort to capture Frankfurt.

After assessing the situation in Byelorussia, the Byelorussian Military District commander, Colonel General Vitaly Ragozin, directs the conversion of one of his last remaining uncommitted forces, the cadre and student body of the Minsk Higher Military-Political Combined Arms School, to the 138th Motor-Rifle Division with the incorporation of any number of stragglers as well as men from the ages of 16-55 in refugee camps in the district. Equipment is appallingly short, but since the division is intended for internal duties the shortages are not crippling.

[chico20854]

June 22, 1998

Nothing official for today. Unofficially,

The thousands of volunteers who have signed up for service with the Mexican Army are being processed, trained and formed into units. Nearly half are sent home for various reasons (health problems, addiction, criminal history or family responsibilities), and the rest are formed into over 80 independent companies of "voluntarios", volunteers. They are given training in basic first aid, marksmanship and small unit tactics; due to a general shortage of modern G3 and FAL rifles most are armed with M1954 bolt-action rifles.

Scout teams from the 40th Infantry Division identify three routes through the Los Angeles area that can, with sufficient troops, be secured for the unit's passage. The command elements of the teams return north to relay the route information to command, establishing observation posts in the Hollywood Hills and other high ground to maintain surveillance over the routes.

The Mexican 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment has transited the Temescal Valley on Interstate 15 into the town of El Cerrito, giving wide berth to the feared glowing remains of March Air force Base, which was nuked by the Soviets in December. The Mexican Marines have pushed the remaining defenders of the North Island naval station into the warren of (nearly entirely empty) ammunition bunkers in the southwest corner of the base, while another Marine detachment secures the western abutment of the Coronado Bridge; sailors defending the other end detonate demolition charges which drop the 1,880-foot long central span into the harbor, blocking the channel. Mexican paratroops have continued their advance north along Interstate 5, clearing the suburban areas between the city and Camp Pendleton of organized resistance. The rear areas in San Diego County are increasingly patrolled by armed Mexican street and criminal gangs allied with the Mexican Army, relieving combat troops for duty fighting the remnant American defenses; additional gang members are active throughout Orange and Los Angeles Counties, attacking small isolated American military units, interdicting supply routes and scouting for enemy troops.

North of Palm Springs the Mexicans adopt a defensive posture while sending small teams of dismounted infantry overland to try to interdict the supply lines supporting 89th (my II) Corps' troops in the Morongo Valley. To the east, the 108th Armored Cavalry Regiment has mostly reformed at Yuma Proving Grounds, Arizona and begins drawing armored vehicles and supplies maintained for units rotating through the base for training. Ammunition and fuel are in short supply.

Brigade Chihuahua resumes its advance as the eastern and northern pincer of 3rd Mexican Army's double envelopment of the garrison of Fort Bliss, leaving the Pecos River behind and turning west into barren desert terrain for Alamogordo and Holloman Air Force Base. The School Brigade launches a combined-arms counterattack across Fort Bliss, with the infantry of the 3rd Battalion, 56th Air Defense Artillery and its attached battery of 12 Diana self-propelled AA guns driving back troops of the Ciudad Juarez Brigade across the parade ground into the southern portions of the cantonment area.

As the reinforced 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment continues its offensive sweep west of San Antonio, Brigade Monterrey launches another series of spoiling attacks to hold down the city's defenders. Adding to the American challenge, Brigade Saltillo has crossed Interstate 37, the highway connecting San Antonio and Corpus Christi, protecting the dead zone between the forces attacking San Antonia and the Coastal Column. That formation's advance on Corpus Christi continues, with forward parties of 2nd Mechanized Brigade's 67th Infantry Regiment probing the defenses of the Chase Field Naval Air Station.

1st Czech Army renews its attacks on I German Korps as it attempts to continue its drive north out of Bayreuth. The fighting is confused as Czech-built T-72s battle the Soviet-built T-72s of the 29th Panzer Division in the dense woods and hills of the border region.

The sailing ship Statsraad Lehmkuh returns to its homeport of Bergen, Norway with its precious cargo of canned beef from Uruguay. After much celebration the task of unloading the ship (it has no cargo handling gear) begins.

A survey of available airfields in the CENTCOM AOR has identified three candidate airfields for CVV-10, the USS Independence air wing, to practice carrier landings. A US Navy SH-3 helicopter is made available to the wing staff to inspect conditions at each of the sites.

[chico20854]

June 23, 1998

Nothing official for the day. Unofficially,

The Joint Chiefs, seeing the continued success of the Mexicans, especially in Texas, order planners to develop options for use of nuclear weapons to slow or halt the invasion. The G-3, operations staff, requests a day to determine what will be needed for such planning to occur, since it is not an area that the Joint Chiefs have previously been involved with. (Strategic nuclear planning had been the purview of the Joint Strategic Planning Staff at SAC headquarters before the TDM, while theater and corps commanders planned theater and tactical nuclear employment).

As Mexican marines clear up the last pockets of resistance at Naval Air Station North Island the commander of the Mexican 2nd Army requests they launch an amphibious assault across the harbor, landing on shores of the international airport and advancing through that complex to the Marine Corps Recruit Depot. The marine commander refuses, referring the Army commander to the Naval Ministry in Mexico City, which directs his operations rather than the Ministry of National Defense, which commands the Army and Air Force. Although it has taken over 40 percent casualties, Brigade Ensenada continues its assault on the San Diego naval base, making progress in reaching the harbor between the base and the massive shipyard, which has now been burning for several days, destroying the destroyer Harry W. Hill, cruiser Mobile Bay and the under-construction replenishment ship Conecuh as well as an unnamed Freedom-class freighter.

The Mexican command issues a strongly-worded directive to the commander of Brigade Nogales, urging him to continue his brigade's forward progress towards Tucson, progress that has been largely halted since the initial days of the invasion. The brigade commander replies with a request for reinforcements for his isolated command, noting the presence of the 111th Military Intelligence Brigade to his east and the reports from his scouts (and criminal gang allies) of a coherent defense of Davis-Monthan Air Force Base on the city's southern limits.

The Battle of El Paso drags on, with inconclusive fighting raging throughout the day. To the west of the city, Mexican trucks are replenishing the Torres Motorized Cavalry Brigade, reinforced with cavalry regiments from Brigade Durango and Brigade Torreon, while the Chihuahua Brigade brings its troops together for an assault on Holloman Air Force Base. The brigade's concentration means that the long supply line back along the unit's route of advance is secured solely by allied civilian gangs, who are more often than not more interested in pillaging than patrolling for American infiltrators or counterattacks.

2nd Mexican Army forces the commander of the San Antonio garrison to decide whether to abandon the city, its military bases (including the large Medina Regional Security Operations Center ELINT station) and population, or to subject it to a costly siege. His calls for assistance to the commanders of the nearby 46th Infantry Division and 95th Training Division are rebuffed by those generals, who plead that their troops are overwhelmed by their ongoing civil relief and rear area security duties and noting that what ammunition and fuel they can spare have already been sent to the city.

The First Regiment of Thirds (which will soon become known as the "Big Bad One") is raised in Florida as part of the City of St. Petersburg Militia. On the other side of the state, the commander of the Jacksonville-Mayport Naval Base and Naval Air Station has formed the sailors from the bases as well as the crews of the various ships and squadrons stranded in the area into a relatively efficient fighting force. The city fathers have by this time requested extensive assistance from the Navy; the action of the naval force has allowed the Jacksonville area to remain an island of stability in the general chaos that is post-nuclear Florida.

All of the 1048th Assault Gun Regiment's vehicles have been disabled, although four of them continue to harbor crewmen that continue to resist. Two of the ISU's main guns are still functional, forcing the surrounding Marines to avoid their limited arcs of fire. The surviving Soviets are effective in covering the blind spots of the other vehicles, and over 40 Marines have been lost in close-in anti-tank actions to neutralize them.

SOOCCENT (Special Operations Command Central, CENTCOM's special operations headquarters) reaches an agreement with XVIII Airborne Corps to allow special operations troops to use the newly established airborne school at Ad Damman, Saudi Arabia. SOCCCENT agrees to provide a small training cadre to establish a HALO course at the school, supplementing the school's basic parachutist, jumpmaster and pathfinder courses.

[chico20854]

June 24, 1998

With Greek troops remaining in Macedonia and beginning the process of annexation, the Albanians withdraw from the temporary alliance between the two nations. Albanian units are directed to cease cooperation with adjacent Greek units.

photo (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1cd47udGsOH6uLTlN9e71bmZct8KZ1Hte/view?usp=sharing)
The Soviet Division Cuba begins movement out of Cuba on Mexican transports. (Unofficially) The hastily-assembled Mexican fleet is insufficient to haul the entire force, so the Soviets press some of the various friendly vessels in port into service, including the Bulgarian freighter A.B. Buzko, which arrived in Cuba in March, the Polish bulker Orlęta Lviv and the Greek Paraguay Express, which sought shelter in Cuban waters when Greece entered the war against NATO in June, 1997. Most of the tanks (export-model T-72 originally intended for the USSR's Caribbean allies, never delivered when war broke out, the Soviets planning to return them home for Red Army use but never confident in their ability to move them securely) are loaded aboard the Soviet Ro/Ro ship Skulptor Golubkina.

Unofficially,

The G-3, Operations officer, for the Joint Chiefs reports his staff's preliminary assessment of the request for nuclear strike options to halt the Mexican invasion. First, political guidance is needed as to the type of targets to be considered - population centers, military bases, command and control facilities, transport hubs, industrial facilities, or something else, as well as the levels of damage assurance and tolerance for civilian casualties. The Joint Strategic Planning Staff was destroyed in the attack on SAC Headquarters in Nebraska in November, and the mobile small staff that survived does not have target information for Mexico, so a reconnaissance effort will be needed. Soviet strikes and the subsequent months of disorder has severely disrupted communications with remaining units equipped with nuclear weapons; while many have been concentrated in "safe" havens, those havens are not necessarily located alongside the delivery systems. Coordination with the G-4 (Logistics) and G-6 (Communications) staffs will be required to develop implementation plans.

In addition to considering nuclear options, the Joint Chiefs attempt to identify additional conventional forces that can be sent to the fight in the Southwest. Noting the impressive performance of the Marine recruits in San Diego, the ongoing resistance offered by the School Brigade at Fort Bliss and the heroic stand of the cadets of the Marine Military Academy in Harlingen, Texas as well as the general breakdown of conscription in CONUS, they condsider it appropriate to convert training formations to combat units. Consequently, they direct the Army Chief of Staff to proceed with converting the many training brigades and divisions in the US (10 divisions and over a dozen brigades) to combat formations.

The fighting in San Diego drags on for another day, although resistance in the burning naval base is beginning to crumble as ammunition and food supplies dwindle and losses mount. The Mexican 1st Mechanized Brigade makes an assault on the Marine Corps Recruit Depot, advancing under the cover of the urban sprawl to within a quarter mile of the Marines' perimeter. Advance patrols from the Mexican 2nd Army and US 63 (my XVI) Corps are independently scouting conditions in the urban waste of Los Angeles and Orange Counties; the Mexican patrols cooperating with the Los Amigos motorcycle gang.

Brigade Chichuahhua's movement out of the Sacramento Mountains to the town of Alamogordo and the adjacent Holloman Air Force Base is delayed by a salvo of MLRS rockets which rips through its leading formations. This is the first time the Mexican unit has come under enemy artillery fire, and it is a sign that they are within range of the 2nd Battalion, 4th Field Artillery, which is covering the 214th Field Artillery Brigade's retreat from the area. (The formation had been operating at White Sands Missile Range since early in 1997). There is no sign of the American artillery beyond the smoke trails in the sky overhead, the brigade commander wisely deciding to keep his vulnerable command at at least stand-off range. The brigade's other battalion, the 3rd Battalion, 9th Artillery, is concurrently on the road north, headed for the relatively safe haven of Canon Air Force Base 250 miles away with its 36 Pershing II intermediate-range missiles.

The School Brigade in Fort Bliss withdraws back north across the parade ground, now a torn-up field of craters and debris, taking cover in the ruined buildings on the northern perimeter, where fighting positions have been created for the brigade's anti-aircraft guns. The open area presents an excellent killing ground for any Mexican frontal attacks; Brigade Ciudad Juarez has begun shifting troops east to attack the post cantonment area through the airfield on the east end. On the northern outskirts of town a patrol from the Torres Motorized Cavalry Brigade captures a small group of stragglers from the Texas 9th State Guard Brigade, which has been smashed over the last few weeks' fighting. The group contains the unit commander, a 68-year old colonel (who incidentally had left the Army in 1971 as a 1st Lieutenant after a combat tour with the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment in Vietnam).

The Mexican 4th Army in Texas continues its relentless advance as the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment crosses Interstate 10 and has Highway 281 north of San Antonio under fire, leaving Interstate 35 as the only major road out of the city. To the east the Coastal Column begins bypassing the ruins of Corpus Christi to the west, with the 2nd Mechanized Brigade capturing Chase Field Naval Air Station following a day and a half long battle against the base security detachment, a battle in which all surviving aircraft were either flown off or burned by he defenders.

The Boeing Skyfoxes of the 198th Tactical Fighter Squadron return to the skies over southern Mexico once again, striking the gas processing facilities at Reforma on the Yucatan. Taking advantage of Mexico's complete lack of air defenses, the counterinsurgency aircraft are able to attack a target usually allocated to advanced medium bombers or fighter-bombers; the strike disables 40 percent of Mexico's remaining natural gas production.

X German Korps, guarding the Rhine frontier near Heidelberg, and XII German Korps, stationed along the Rhine northwest of Frankfurt, are ordered onto the lines south of Frankfurt.

Behind Soviet/North Korean lines, supplies are pushed forward to front-line units, while many Soviet divisions begin to call in more dispersed detachments that have been spread out through the country maintaining order, concentrating near the front lines.

[chico20854]

June 25, 1998

Nothing in canon for the day. Unofficially,

After an overnight session discussing options, a dialogue usually held by the nation's highest political leaders, the Joint Chiefs respond to their G-3's request for orders. Having ended debate with "Let the historians 50 or 100 years from now debate whether or not this is the right decision. We don't have the conventional forces to stop the invasion. Nonetheless, this effort will be to halt offensive operations, not kill millions of Mexicans. We've got to live with these people after the Recovery, after all." GEN Cummings, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, directs that American nuclear forces are to strike the headquarters of the Mexican Ministry of Defense in Mexico City and the logistic/transportation hubs in northern Mexico that are supporting the invasion. The minimal possible yields required to neutralize the targets are to be used, minimizing civilian casaulties and, hopefully, fallout over American territory. Cummings realizes that the transport hubs are relatively "hard" targets, likely requiring fallout-creating ground bursts, but decides that the tradeoff is one that must unfortunately be made.

One of the 40th Infantry Division's observation posts in the Hollywood Hills, taking advantage of the disappearance of smog over the Los Angeles area with the death of LA's automobile culture, observes the green fields of the Naval Weapons Station Seal Beach in the vast field of ruins that was LA. The observation is relayed up the chain of command and the division's Aviation Brigade is tasked to dispatch a patrol to examine it. The main body of the division's 2nd Brigade departs Camp Roberts, headed south, behind a screen established by the 1st Squadron, 18th Cavalry (-). To the east, the 1st Brigade, 4th Armored Division has sent another battalion (the 3rd Battalion, 51st Infantry) to the front, bolstering the flank security as 89th (my II) Corps prepares for an armored counterattack to drive Brigade Mexicali back from the Imperial Valley.

It is an inauspicious day for the American defense of the Southwest, with the collapse of resistance at the San Diego Naval Base and the evacuation of key assets from San Antonio as the commander of Lackland Air Force Base prepares to surrender his command to the Mexican 4th Army. Fires rage at the Merida Annex as the intelligence operators destroy their sensitive signals intelligence equipment and burn years worth of records, while their supply specialists hurriedly rush to issue them all uniforms grabbed from Lackland's Air Force basic training barracks, allowing the intelligence specialists to blend in with the new recruits. Meanwhile, the commanders of the major military hospitals in the city, which have been an island of calm and comfort for some of the most severely wounded survivors of battlefields around the world, address their staffs and prepare them for the oncoming reality of life under Mexican occupation, offering them the opportunity to abandon their patients and evacuate; few do.

To the north, the commanders of Army units that have seemingly done their level best to avoid preparing for the upcoming battle are rattled out of their stupor by the impending fall of San Antonio. The 46th Infantry Division dispatches six companies, from six separate battalions, to the south to contain the oncoming Coastal Column; the division's heavy weapons and armored vehicles were sent to Europe as replacements earlier in the year and the division has not been able to replace its B Companies, which were sent overseas as replacements in the fall as well. The 95th Training Division at Fort Hood forms a reaction regiment, formed around the three battalions of trained tanker privates that graduated training earlier in the year but remained assigned to the division after transportation system breakdown stranded them at the base; the privates are assigned tank commanders from among the division's drill sergeants and recovering wounded located on and near the base. The formation tries to wrangle enough fuel to try platoon and company-level manuevers in the hodgepoddge of training tanks the division maintains as part of its mission to turn out replacement tank drivers and loaders.

The bad news for the American defenders of the Southwest continues, with the Chihuahua Brigade overrunning Holloman Air Force Base in central New Mexico. With news of the base's capture the Torres Motorized Cavalry Brigade launches its portion of 3rd Army's double envelopment of the Fort Bliss garrison, striking north along Interstate 25 through uncoordinated Texas State Guard roadblocks.

The diversion of troops and supplies from rear areas in Germany to the front creates opportunities for many of the armed bands roaming the country's interior to intensify their ravaging of the country. Along the northern portion of the former Inner-German Border, 5th Squad and its allied group 5th Squadron begin establishing semi-permanent control of rural areas.

Unloading of the sail training ship Statsraad Lehmkuh in Bergen, Norway has been completed and the ship is moved to the shipyard for minor repairs following its long voyage to South America and back.

The carrier USS John F. Kennedy, damaged by a mine off the Greek coast, limps into Marsaxlokk Bay on the southeastern end of the island of Malta, accompanied by its escorts. The local authorities object to the entry of combatant warships into their neutral port - legally they are obligated to intern the ships and their crews for the duration of the conflict if they remain beyond 24 hours, and international law (the Hague Convention of 1907) limits combatant vessels to three in any single port, while the Kennedy is accompanied by three escorts and the oiler USNS Lenthal. The carrier's commander is claiming the right to refuge while repairing the ship to a seaworthy state, and offers to order some of his escorts to sail to Valetta, the capital, to comply with the limitation on vessel numbers.

3rd and 4th Marine Aircraft Wings, operating from a number of fields in and around Bandar Abbas along with a rear reserve base at Al Minhad Air Base in the UAE, is able to maintain its aircraft better than nearly any other combatant air formation in the world thanks to the support it receives from the advanced maintenance detachment on board the aviation maintenance ship SS Curtiss, a US government-owned, civilian manned freighter outfitted with a large helipad and extensive containerized workshops and spare parts stores. The converted merchantman is semi-permanently moored in Bandar Abbas, servicing helicopters onboard while a detachment ashore overhauls fixed-wing aircraft at Havadarya airport, adjacent to the port.

The 27th (my 90th) Tank Division, loaded on a series of six steam-powered trains, reaches the Volga River at Zelenodolsk, where the railroad troops have repaired one of the two spans of the bridge which was destroyed by an American B-2 bomber in December. The division's locomotives are replenished with additional coal from semi-abandoned river barges tied up nearby, giving them enough fuel to continue their journey west.

[chico20854]

June 26, 1998

Following nearly two months of assembly, company and battalion-level training and delays in transportation, 19 Infantry Brigade is deployed from England to Germany.

Matagorda Island air base, a small facility in coastal Texas used to support training flights and coastal zone patrols, is abandoned. The base is stripped and blown up, leaving nothing remaining but the charred frameworks of empty Quonset huts and hangars and a badly cratered runway.

Unofficially,

A series of orders are issued from Colorado Springs to implement the Joint Chiefs' directive to prepare for nuclear strikes on Mexican targets. One of the first units to move are the National Guard Green Berets of the 19th Special Forces Group's designated Direct Action B-Team, who load onto an Army National Guard C-27 transport for infiltration behind Mexican lines south of the Rio Grande. Likewise, the cadre of the Military Freefall School at Yuma Proving Ground and a detachment from the USAF Special Operations Center at Kirtland AFB, New Mexico are dropped behind Mexican lines, into Baja California and central Mexico, respectively. All three detachments are tasked with identifying the routes used by Mexican logistics truck convoys and where they are loading from. The paratroops all jump with motorcycles and FAVs to provide rapid cross-country mobility.

Mexican forces largely spend the day absorbing the previous day's captures and attempting to establish secure lines to prevent the escape of thousands of American military personnel who are attempting to escape Mexican captivity as well as manage the streams of refugees fleeing to American-held territory.

The B Team from the 8th SF Group in Chiapas, southern Mexico, has begun to arm the men of several small indigenous villages, preparing them to take up arms against the remnants of local authorities. To the south, at Cato Sano air base in Honduras, aviation fuel supplies are dwindling, with what remains allocated to supply drops to support the Green Berets; the 198th Tactical Fighter Squadron is largely grounded pending delivery of more fuel.

The 47th Infantry Division falls back through British Columbia, following several days of strong Soviet pressure and intelligence reports that the Soviets may have recently received additional tactical nuclear weapons. The American division is accompanied by Canadian territorial troops.

Fighting rages in Heidelberg, Germany as a combined force of German border guards (both former East and West German), the East German reservists of the 219th Motor-Rifle Division and a mixed bag of American rear area support troops rallies to blunt the latest assault by the Soviet 41st Army, which has driven back the Danish Expeditionary Force before turning west, squeezing out the waning Italian 3rd Corps.

The Maltese authorities back down, faced with the firepower of the Kennedy battle group. The government, already straining to support its population, has no desire for American gunboats to be less than a kilometer from its seat of power. The carrier commander has offered to allow Maltese authorities to examine the condition of his ship, verifying its need for repairs; unfortunately the harbor has only a small boatyard to service the town's fishing fleet and there is no shipyard in the nation capable of drydocking the massive carrier. Maltese officials are eager to speed the Americans' departure, unable to support the needs of the thousands of sailors aboard.

A skirmish breaks out between Albanian troops of the 24th Division and the Greek IX Infantry Division jointly occupying the Suvenir ammunition plant in western Macedonia; the erstwhile allies had been sharing the plant's output as well as jointly operating the nearby hydropower plant that keeps the machinery going.

The airborne school operated by XVIII Airborne Corps accepts its first non-U.S. Army troops. The class starting today has two British students and an Iranian student as well as a trio of Marines headed for 4th Marine Division's Force Reconnaissance detachment.

[chico20854]

June 27, 1998

Nothing official for the day. Unofficially,

A patrol from the 40th Infantry Division's 1st Squadron, 18th Cavalry, detached from the main body of the squadron, reaches the outer perimeter of the Naval Weapons Station Seal Beach. After a few tense moments as both armed formations verify each other's status, contact is made and within an hour word is relayed to 63rd (my XVI) Corps Headquarters that several companies worth of heavily armed and trained teens from the California 10th Cadet Brigade are intact and loyal.

Further south, Brigade Ensenada, which has sustained nearly 50 percent losses so far in the Battle of San Diego, regroups before joining 1st Mechanized Brigade in attacking the dug-in Marines of the Recruit Training Depot. The Marines receive much-needed assistance from a daring low-level night flight by a pair of CH-53E heavy-lift helicopters of HMT-302, which brings in food, ammunition (including several cases of 40mm grenades, the first the defenders have received to date), medical supplies and two under-slung LAV-25s with full loads of fuel and ammunition. They evacuate the wounded as they depart; the flights are a huge boost to morale.

The at-least theoretical encirclement of the Fort Bliss garrison is completed with the linkup of forward elements of the Torres Motorized Cavalry Brigade's 9th Motorized Cavalry Regiment and the Chihuahua Brigade's 76th Infantry Regiment at the top of San Augustin Pass east of the town of Las Cruces, New Mexico. (The encirclement is theoretical because Brigade Chihuahua has left only two of its infantry regiments spread out over the 440-mile route of its advance to secure its supply line and occupy the vast area it has traversed.) Brigade Chihuahua's drive west to link up with the Torres Brigade has allowed the 214th Field Artillery Brigade and the remnants of the Holloman Air Force Base garrison to withdraw northward unopposed; the 214th's Pershing missiles arriving safely at Canon Air Force Base in Clovis, New Mexico safely today. In El Paso, Brigade Torreon has reached full strength with the arrival of its final regiment from the Mexican interior; Brigade Durango still has a single regiment on the way.

The first battalion (6-112 Armor) of the 49th Armored Division loads its vehicles aboard ten open deck barges in the Mississippi River in Quincy, Illinois. The remainder of 3rd Brigade and Division headquarters are en route, while 2nd Brigade is headed for Evansville, Indiana and 1st Brigade is to load at La Crosse, Wisconsin.

In its first actions against now-veteran Mexican troops, the companies of the 46th Infantry Division dispatched to halt the Mexican invasion are roughly handled, unexpectedly being thrown back by the firepower and deft maneuvering of Brigade Matamoros and the 2nd Mechanized Brigade. Three of the companies disintegrate under the pressure of Mexican follow-on attacks.

RainbowSix reports that Major Nikita Drozdov, a highly trained KGB officer who speaks fluent English who was covertly inserted into the UK in late 1996 under the code name Kyril and initially based in East Anglia, makes his way to Leicester using the alias Jim Ross.

Fighting in Northern Ireland flares up, as the IRA and Irish Army launch their long-planned summer offensive. Initial attacks out of Catholic enclaves in Londonderry and Belfast are rebuffed by strong Loyalist and British Army defenses.

Heavier NATO reinforcements, in the form of the V US Corps and VI German Korps, which contain the remains of armored divisions and the complement of corps-level engineer, artillery and other supporting formations and which have spent the preceding months absorbing what few replacements that had arrived and rebuilding, are fully engaged. V Corps’ 28th Infantry Division establishes a series of strong blocking positions along the roads northwest of Schweinfurt which VII US Corps passes through.

Fighting in occupied Macedonia spreads throughout the zone jointly occupied by Greek and Albanian troops. The fighting is confused, with no front lines, numerous armed bands of Jugoslav deserters, partisans and armed civilians and both occupying armies' positions intermixed, with small isolated positions along major supply routes, in towns and key villages, and in power plants and industrial facilities.

[chico20854]

June 28, 1998

Another day with nothing in canon. Unofficially,

The Governor of California, having received word of the 10th California Cadet Brigade's status, and exercising his authority as commander of the California State Guard, demands that the unit not be committed to action against the invading Mexican Army, on account of the young age of its members. (Over 80 percent of the unit is under the age of 20). The 63 (my XVI) Corps commander counters with a commitment to use the formation for rear area security, protecting the corps' vulnerable supply convoys and routes through the ruins of Los Angeles.

In San Diego, the surrounded Marines come under renewed attack from the combined forces of Brigade Ensenada, Brigade Hermosilla and the 1st Mechanized Brigade, whose AMX-13 light tanks, protected by infantry teams, are used as assault guns to reduce Marine strongpoints with well-aimed 90mm fire.

Armored battles rage in southern California as 80 (my II) Corps launches its counterattack. The combined 177th Armored Brigade and 1st Brigade, 4th Armored Division sweep south, overrunning the pickets of Mexicali Brigade, which are woefully lacking in anti-tank weaponry. Simultaneously, the 108th Armored Cavalry Regiment and 223rd Armored Regiment drive west from Yuma Proving Ground, with the 223rd (the Yuma NTC OPFOR) launching a frontal attack along Interstate 10 to tie down LaPaz Brigade while the cavalry undertakes a sweeping flanking maneuver through the desert to the north.

With Mexican forces bypassing Fort Bliss, the commander of the School Brigade orders preparations for a withdrawal to the northeast, across the vast Dona Ana range complex and into southeastern New Mexico. A convoy of private cars and trucks is organized to move the dependents and civilian employees who remain sheltered on the base, which will be escorted by troops in HMMWVs while the main body of the brigade will travel in tactical vehicles. One battalion-sized task force will lead, prepared to punch its way through any Mexican blocking positions. A second battalion-sized group, commanded by the staff of the 6th Battalion, 56th Air Defense Artillery, will serve as the rear guard, while the brigade support troops and headquarters will travel in the center of the formation, which will be spread out over a nearly 15-mile length of desert.

The 200 sailors assigned to the 2nd Tennessee State Guard Regiment have been fully integrated into the force as its 6th Battalion. They are well armed, with an array of obsolescent but fully functional small arms and a well-equipped heavy weapons company, with 18 90mm recoilless rifles and 36 M1919 light machineguns. The force is assigned to secure the Mississippi River crossings; reinforcements if the battalion needs it are identified as the Regiment's Rapid Response Force, a company-sized unit of former SWAT officers led by a one-legged retired US Army tank commander, Colonel Harlan Wilson. That unit is assigned a quartet of modernized M20 armored cars formerly assigned to the State Police.

In Quincy, Illinois, commanders from the 6th Battalion, 112th Armor begin constructing defensive works aboard the barges that will carry 3rd Brigade and Division Headquarters, 49th Armored Division to Oklahoma.

The first ships carrying the Soviet forces from Cuba arrive in the eastern Mexican port of Altamira. Upon unloading, the troops are moved to a nearby (formerly American-owned) ranch for training. For while the unit is in theory a combat-ready Red Army division, is is actually composed of three separate detachments - the 7th Specialized Motor-Rifle Brigade (a reinforced motor-rifle regiment with a tank battalion, a BMP battalion, two BTR battalions, an artillery battalion as well as air defense, rocket artillery, engineer and recon companies), a contingent of over 3,000 military personnel (mostly officers and long-service NCOs and warrant officers) from all branches of service that had been assigned as advisors to the Cuban military, and finally over 5,000 Soviet civilians who were living in Cuba and who are being ejected along with their military brethren. Before being committed to action, Major General Femerov wants time to forge this collection of men into a capable fighting force. It is blessed with a nearly full complement of armored vehicles and heavy weapons which had been in Cuba, originally intended for the USSR's Caribbean allies (Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela).

Fighting for Heidelberg, Germany rages as Soviet forces attempt to drive the NATO defenders out. German troops are defending the heavily built up Old Town and castle, with artillery observers on the Konigstuhl mountain on the east side of town, while American defenders are rushing to complete hardening of positions in Patton Kaserne on the west side of town.

The 1048th Assault Gun Regiment has been nearly entirely eliminated. Patient work by a detachment from the 1st Battalion, 6th Marines has set all the hulks of disabled Soviet assault guns ablaze, and continued resistance has largely stopped. A handful of stragglers remain dug in, resisting calls for their surrender and fighting on despite lack of food and water.

The nuclear missile cruiser USS Virginia has scoured many hundreds of miles of empty Southern Pacific waters in search of enemy shipping but turned up nothing as it approaches the Galapagos Islands.

The newly-formed 138th Motor-Rifle Division departs the training grounds on the outskirts of the town of Borisov, Byelorussia, a key transportation point on the Moscow-Minsk railroad line, and relieves the MVD, police and Party officials of responsibility for the town.

[chico20854]

June 29, 1998

Nothing official for the day. Unofficially,

A series of confused actions break out in the ruins of Los Angeles and Orange County, California as 63 (my XVI) Corps begins moving into the metro area in force, encountering Mexican troops of the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment and allied criminal and biker gangs. Neither side has the troop density to secure the area and supplies and communications on both sides are poor.

To the east, 89 (my II) Corps' coordinated attacks are making progress, with Mexican forces falling back before the massed American armor. Unfortunately, the American formations are short of infantry, leaving many isolated groups of Mexican stragglers in the American rear. American commanders are pleased with their success, but ammunition and fuel supplies are rapidly dwindling.

In San Diego, Mexican troops have broken onto the eastern end of the Marine base, fighting through several administrative and barracks structures on the east end of the base. The elite paratroops who landed at Miramar Naval Air Station on the first day of the invasion are sitting out the fight, as are the Mexican marines; both high-quality formations instead moving north along the coast against scattered opposition while clearing the coastal axis for further use.

The School Brigade begins its breakout from surrounded Fort Bliss, heading out over unpaved range roads out of the cantonment area. The column, a mix of tactical, civilian and commercial-type vehicles, moves at an aggravating 7 miles per hour, creating a massive dust cloud that causes drivers to repeatedly jam on their brakes after losing sight of the vehicle ahead of them. The rearguard 6th Battalion, 56th Air Defense Artillery, holds off a probe by troops of Brigade Torreon.

Further east in Texas, 4th Mexican Army's western force resumes its advance after sweeping through San Antonio. Finding the SIGINT station at Merida ablaze, the Mexican forces make a modest attempt to segregate the station's staff from the trainees in the mass of POWs, but they are overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of military personnel that they are suddenly responsible for. Numerous escapes occur as the American troops slip away past the overwhelmed Mexican guards; The 4th Army commander is willing to delegate administration of the city and the POWs to his allied criminal and biker gangs, allowing his troops to continue their drive north.

The Mexican "Coastal Column" accelerates its drive against the widely dispersed and under-equipped American 46th Infantry Division. The Mexican command sends its infantry regiments (each roughly equivalent to an American light infantry battalion although lacking anti-tank firepower) on multiple parallel roads, seeking out American positions. When one is found, the entire regiment concentrates its firepower on the Americans, who are often in squad or platoon strength. The speed of advance is faster than the overwhelmed American command can respond to, and by nightfall another roughly eight companies of Americans have been defeated and the front line moved 12 miles north, skirting the western edge of the ruins of the Houston Metroplex.

The American deep reconnaissance teams in the Mexican rear have traced the flow of supply trucks back to railheads in Mexico, the overtaxed Mexican rail operator unable as yet to extend service into captured American territory. When news of this is relayed back to Colorado Springs, nuclear planners, using relatively rudimentary maps of the Mexican rail network, focus on four key junctions in the Mexican rail network that can isolate the border region from the rest of Mexico. Urgent orders are issued for detailed radar reconnaissance to be performed of the sites; a E-8 JSTARS aircraft at Tinker Air Force Base, Oklahoma is readied for flight.

The Mexican Ministry of Defense issues orders for units in Mexico to stand up additional infantry regiments, calling on the tens of thousands of partially-trained draftees released into the reserves in prior years; the new regiments will allow additional forces to be fed into the fighting in Texas and California.

Daily gains by Pact forces advancing in southern Germany are measured in hundreds of meters rather than kilometers. Pact forces have depleted their initial stockpiles and are not able to obtain food and fuel from the areas they have overrun. The Soviet effort does not have enough fuel or trucks to replenish units in action. Meanwhile, NATO resistance has stiffened.

In Heidelberg, having lost several hundred men for only nominal gains, the Soviet commander of the 41st Army orders his motor-rifle troops (the 30th Guards Motor-Rifle Division) to maintain the pressure on the city's defenders while directing his armored reserve - the battered 62nd Tank Division - to bypass the town to the west, attempting to "thread the needle" between Heidelberg and the ruined city of Mannheim to the northwest, with the Army's remnant 1318th Independent Air Assault Regiment (down to six weak companies) attempting to infiltrate in advance to locate a suitable crossing point over the Neckar River.

The Iranian Air Force continues its attempts to liberate its country by weakening the enemy forces occupying its territory. While the remaining attack helicopters (a few dozen pre-revolutionary AH-1 Cobras that were rebuilt in the US and Israel from 1994-6, bringing them nearly on par with the US Army and USMC's AH-1V King Cobras) are dedicated to supporting the ongoing counter-marauder operations, the fixed-wing fighter-bomber fleet is striking Soviet targets behind the front lines. An example of this is the day's mission package, which sees an early-morning sortie by F-20s of the 42nd Tactical Fighter Squadron with reconnaissance pods to verify targets located the prior day. The flights last less than 45 minutes, at low altitude, and the aircraft are met on the taxiway by a jeep, ready to rush the onboard film to waiting intelligence analysts. (The Iranians are not equipped with the latest real-time recon pods). A quick review concludes that the target, a battery of ML-20 152mm howitzers of 32nd Army's 400th Gun Artillery Brigade, are still in place and the waiting flight of F-4Es of the 61st Tactical Fighter Squadron takes off. Top cover is provided by a pair of F-15s from the American 1st Tactical Fighter Wing, with command coordinated by Iranian officers operating from a hardened bunker under Shiraz International Airport. The F-4s, flying at low level through the Zagros Mountains, attract scattered small-arms fire as they approach the target area, popping up to 1000 feet for weapons delivery. The artillery battery, located some 15 km behind the front line, is defended by the 32nd Army's depleted 272nd Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade; the defenders light up a single SA-11 launcher's radars and fire three missiles, all that the ready battery has remaining. (The battery was alerted by the earlier F-20 overflight to the possibility that the Iranians might be back.) One of the missiles peppers the trailing Phantom with shrapnel, and it continues on the attack run trailing smoke rather than peel off and be vulnerable to being picked off separately; the other two missiles miss. The F-4s blanket the battery (down to three guns from its prewar four) with 96 500-lb bombs, set for a mix of impact and airburst; the blast and shrapnel from the dozens of bombs thoroughly demolish the howitzers, their prime movers, crews and much of the ammunition dumped at the battery. The return flight is uneventful, and upon landing the damaged Phantom is assessed as likely needing several months of repair in the conditions of 1998 Iran.

[chico20854]

June 30, 1998

The 106th Guards Air Assault Division arrives in the Ryazan area for reconstruction from the remaining elements of the Airborne center there. (Unofficially) It ends up absorbing not only the center's remaining personnel but also a number of local militias and MVD troops. It also dispatches a detachment to scavenge the site of the Kubinka Armor Museum, which yields a hodgepodge of aged and unique armor, a mixed blessing given the burden it places on the unit's mechanics.

Unofficially,

The destroyer USS John Paul Jones (DDG-32), which reactivated in November after over a decade in reserve, appears off the coast of San Diego. Its missile launchers are empty, but the ship boasts over 450 rounds of ammunition for its pair of 5-inch guns, many of which are expended over the next few hours as experienced ANGLICO spotter teams ashore direct the destroyer's fire on Mexican positions. This fire forces the Mexican force to avoid the open ground along the base's southern and western edges.

The Marine Corps belatedly organizes the cadre and miscellaneous staff at its base at Twentynine Palms as an ad-hoc force composed of two infantry battalions and a LAV-25 scout company and places the command, designated Task Force Devil Dog, at the disposal of the 89 (my II) Corps commander. That corps' attack is beginning to slow as the meagre stockpiles of fuel in California are increasingly depleted by the movement of 63 (my XVI) and 89 (my II) Corps.

The School Brigade's overland movement out of Fort Bliss continues, with the rearguard 5th Battalion, 56th Air Defense Artillery slipping out of the cantonment area in the early morning hours, leaving a massive inferno behind as the few remaining undamaged buildings are torched to deny them to the enemy. The column is forced to halt mid-morning as the temperature rises and the many civilian-type vehicles begin to suffer from the relentless dust and rough tank trails; the halt gives the column time to clear filters, refuel and distribute water to the passengers.

To the west, the Torres Motorized Cavalry Regiment (releasing the cavalry regiments of the Torreon and Durango Brigades back to their parent commands to pursue the School Brigade) begins advancing on the next strategic target, New Mexico's largest city, Albuquerque. The Mexican armored cars advance up Interstate 25, staying on the western bank of the Rio Grande.

4th Army's drive up the Interstate 35 corridor resumes, with the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment reaching the perimeter fence of Bergstrom Air Force Base and the capital city of Austin, which the Governor and his bodyguard of Texas Rangers has fled for the safety of, initially, Waco. To its east, Brigade Saltillo is engaged in fierce combat with the 2nd Texas Brigade at Camp Swift; the relatively fresh Mexican troops have greater amounts of ammunition as well as more heavy weapons (particularly mortars) which give them the advantage. The 91st Training Division dispatches its reaction regiment to Austin to try to slow the Mexican advance, while directing its remaining trainees to preparing defenses for Fort Hood.

A E-8 JSTARS of the 968th Airborne Warning and Control Training Squadron, one of two training aircraft remaining in the US, flies an operational sortie over Mexico, its radar system mapping a number of targets throughout the central part of the country. It is escorted on the mission by a pair of F-16s of the 388th Tactical Fighter Wing to ensure that the Mexican Air Force's F-5 fleet, believed to be neutralized over a week prior, does not interfere with the vital mission. When the JSTARS crosses back into American territory the radar map information is relayed to the Joint Chiefs as well as several Air Force bases in the region. Upon receipt, the data is pored over by mission planners and by midnight orders are being issued.

The 47th Infantry Division, fighting alone in British Columbia, tries to hobble together a defense of the vital transportation hub of Prince George. The isolated division commander fears that Soviet troops advancing overland from the port of Prince Rupert will sever his escape route as his troops undertake a fighting withdrawal against Soviet troops that are pushing south from the Yukon.

The pace of the Pact advance in southern Germany is limited by logistic challenges and poor communications and motivation - Soviet, Czech and Italian troops are aware of the strategic goal of the campaign but are reluctant to be killed in a war that it is very clear has been lost by all sides. Isolated NATO positions are taking days or weeks to reduce, since there is insufficient ammunition (or troops) to overrun them, resorting to sieges to defeat the defenders.

The defense of Heidelberg holds, despite appalling conditions for everyone (soldiers on both sides and civilians which have not fled) in the city. Fires rage, the streets are choked with debris and trash as well as running with a disease-ridden ooze of oil, sewage and who knows what. Supplies for the defenders are running low, with hastily drafted civilian porters and NATO headquarters troops daring to cross the Neckar River carrying duffel bags stuffed with a somewhat standard allocation of ammunition (including a handful of pre-loaded magazines), water and rations. Soviet troops make minimal gains in the day's fighting.

[chico20854]

July 1, 1998

With North Korean People's Army support, the Soviet 194th Motor Rifle Division, reinforced by the 203rd Air Assault Brigade, crosses the DMZ and forges south.

Unofficially,

effects (https://nuclearsecrecy.com/nukemap/?&airburst=0&hob_ft=0&hob_opt=2&psi=20,5,1&linked=1&kt=0.3&lat=19.4405594&lng=-99.2165086&zm=13)
American bombers and missiles fan out in the early morning hours, carrying out the Joint Chief's orders to use nuclear weapons to slow or halt the Mexican invasion. A B-1B from the 337th Bomb Squadron takes off from its dispersal base (Altus Air Force Base, Oklahoma), heading for Mexico City with a pair of B-61 bombs aboard. As it crosses the border over Big Bend National Park at low level and Mach 1, the 214th Field Artillery Brigade, evacuated from White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico to Cannon Air Force Base, New Mexico launches a pair of Pershing II Intermediate-Range missiles at the railyards at Los Mochis and Torreon. Meanwhile, F-16s from the 388th Tactical Fighter Wing head for the Mexican cities of Saltillo and Monterrey, to strike railyards hubs near those cities. The B-1B arrives over Mexico City after the rail strikes have occurred, striking the Ministry of Defense building with one of the bombs. The bomb is set for 0.3 kT, enough to flatten the building but not enough to start a firestorm or create massive damage on Mexico's largest city. The Pershing II and F-16 strikes, all ground bursts, are higher yield in order to ensure the destruction of the railyards. (The steel rails, heavily anchored and only centimeters above the ground, are particularly resistant to blast and thermal damage; a ground burst vaporizing the rails as it forms a crater is the surest way to ensure destruction.)

The Mexican Navy's Pacific Fleet sorties from its forward base in Ensenada, ordered to drive off the American destroyer USS John Paul Jones and interdict the San Diego battle zone. The Mexican task force is built around two Second World War-era American destroyers, which have been meticulously maintained but are running low on fuel.

The final surviving member of the 1048th Assault Gun Regiment's ill-fated raid into II MEF's rear area in northwestern Poland is finally killed by US Marines as he shelters in a dugout underneath his disabled ISU-152 assault gun.

[chico20854]

July 2, 1998

Allied airstrikes slow the Soviet advance across the battle-scarred ground south of the DMZ (fought over 18 months prior) as ROK and American mechanized forces are quickly marshalled into place to respond.

Unofficially,

The nuclear strikes on Mexico City and key railroad bottlenecks has an immediate effect on the Mexican war effort. Central control over the actions of the three engaged armies disintegrates following the destruction of the Ministry of National Defense headquarters, and 1st Army, responsible for rear area operations in most of Mexico, is forced to shift emphasis from generating additional forces and supplies for the war to the north to maintaining order among a desperate, scared and unstable populace. The Presidential Guard Brigade is deployed to secure other government buildings (and, unofficially, neighborhoods populated by rich and powerful regime members and supporters), while the Military Police Brigade and Engineer Brigade try to provide disaster relief and maintain order.

There is little immediate effect on the armies fighting to the north, as there are still a few days of supplies already in the pipeline north of the strikes, and except for a few senior officers the fighting troops are wholly unaware of the strikes to their south, so poor is communication with the center.

The Joint Chiefs are grimly satisfied with the execution of the strikes and issue orders for the special operations teams which provided spotting and bomb damage assessment for the strikes to withdraw, remaining undetected if possible.

The fallout from the surface bursts begins to fall closer to the border, although of lower radiation intensity.

An old-fashioned naval battle rages off the California Coast as the Mexican Pacific fleet engages the American destroyer USS John Paul Jones (DDG-32), the newest vessel in the engagement at 40 years of age. The gun battle favors the Mexicans, whose World War Two-vintage destroyers feature a total of eight 5-inch manually fed guns facing the American's two semi-automatic 5-inch guns and a magazine depleted by days of shore bombardment in San Diego. Both opponents' fire control systems are equally dated, and the crews of about equal ability (the American crew a mix of inexperienced draftees and seasoned veterans, the Mexicans well-trained pre-war regulars). The Mexican flotilla splits into two parallel columns sailing north, one to the seaward side of John Paul Jones' track and one in between the American ship and the shore. The maneuver forces the American ship to concentrate the fire of its forward, unobstructed turret, on one enemy ship, the inshore Quezacoatl, while zig-zagging to allow the rear turret to fire at the seaward Netzahuacoyotl without presenting the a broadside opportunity. After a few minutes of back-and-forth gunfire the range drops to six nautical miles and both sides rapidly begin registering hits. Quezacoatl is the first one to fall out of battle, its bridge perforated by shrapnel and its aged steam plant offline. John Paul Jones' steam plant is the next to fail from battle damage, and as it glides to a halt the damaged Netzahuacoyotl unleashes another eight rounds, leaving the American ship ablaze. The damaged Netzahuacoyotl breaks off the engagement and turns south, heading to Ensenada for urgently needed repairs, leaving the sailors of both floundering ships to make their way ashore on their own. By sundown both destroyers have slipped below the waves, with moderate loss of life from both crews.

Some of the American sailors land in Mexican-controlled territory and begin a cat-and-mouse effort to evade patrols, while a dozen or so manage to come ashore into territory still held by the embattled marines, who once again repulse a fierce Mexican attack. LCpl Steven Barker, one of the defending recruits who has already been recognized for his coolness under fire and bravery, destroys one of 1st Mechanized Brigade's AMX-13 light tanks with a well-placed shot from his M203 grenade launcher.

Farther up the coast of California, the forward detachment of the 196th Infantry Brigade, advancing into Anaheim from the high ground south of City of Industry, catches a resupply column supporting the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment unawares, capturing the unit's supply of food, fuel and water for the day as well as crippling future resupply capability. The 2nd Brigade, 40th Infantry Division has relieved the 10th California Cadet Brigade, whose largely teenaged soldiers have been evacuated to secure the Interstate 5 corridor leading north to the vital Bakersfield refinery complex, source of 6th Army's fuel.

2nd Battalion, 56th Air Defense Artillery, which has assumed the lead of the School Brigade's column, encounters the first enemy troops in the unit's breakout drive, an isolated squad from Brigade Chihuahua in the small mountain community of Piñon, New Mexico. The Mexicans are surrounded and surrender without a fight.

In southern Arizona, Brigade Nogales, which has been sitting nearly immobile for weeks, increases its patrolling, trying to determine if the 111th Military Intelligence Brigade at Fort Huachuca and the defense force at Davis-Monthan AFB in Tucson are still strong forces that the isolated brigade cannot overcome.

While still struggling to deal with the capture of San Antonio, the Mexican 4th Army closes its forces on Austin. The 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment sweeps across Bergstrom Air Force Base, although too late to capture any intact aircraft or significant supplies; the defenders burned many of the buildings before evacuating. The division-sized Coastal Column is bypassing the ruins of Houston, sweeping aside penny packets of infantry dispatched in an ineffective effort by the 46th Infantry Division's command to halt the Mexican invasion while still maintaining tight control of the oilfields, ranches and farms and refugee camps of East Texas.

In southeastern Nebraska the winter wheat harvest begins. Military forces are deployed in what force can be spared to protect the tankers bringing fuel to the agricultural areas and to guard the harvest as it is brought in. Many grain depots on the rail lines double as garrisons for the troops that are dedicated to ensuring that this vital source of food for the nation is secure; the harvest continues through the month.

In the refugee camps west of Pittsburgh, a charismatic leader is making the rounds, raising an army of disaffected evacuees from Ohio to "seize the stocks of food that the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is holding back from us and our suffering armies."

X German Korps and XII German Korps are heavily engaged on the front lines south of Frankfurt and the meatgrinder battle for Heidelberg. While composed of West German territorials, border guards (both former East and West German) and East German reservists, these additional trained and motivated troops stiffen the NATO defense.

Maltese authorities raise another ineffective demand for the USS John F Kennedy battle group to move on. The American admiral in charge of the flotilla refuses, citing the damage to his flagship (while ignoring the inability of any shipyard in Malta to repair it to a sufficiently seaworthy condition; the small boatyard in Marsaxlokk is sufficient solely to support the town's fishing fleet).

[chico20854]

July 3, 1998

Nothing in canon for the day. Unofficially,

The fighting in San Diego continues, although not to the advantage of the encircled Marines. The heroic pilots of the CH-53Es from HMT-302 return overnight, brining in additional supplies of ammunition, water and food and evacuating over 50 wounded Marines, but one of the huge helicopters is shot down by Mexican machinegun fire while taking off on the return flight, crashing on the Recruit Depot's northern perimeter, which is already behind the Mexican front line. With the squadron already displaced from its home station at MCAS Tustin by the advance of Mexican paratroops, forcing it to operate from Port Hueneme, the squadron commander prohibits further resupply flights during clear nights. In the encircled garrison, Mexican troops of Brigade Hermosillo advance into the northeastern portion of the base, reaching the wide Belleau Wood Avenue after overrunning a maze of burning supply and service buildings.

Reinforced with the infantry of Task Force Devil Dog and additional fuel supplies, 89 (my II) Corps resumes its assault in the Imperial Valley, driving Brigade Mexicali back to the cover of the shattered and abandoned city of Palm Springs. To the east, the other pincer of the corps offensive sees success, with the 108th Armored Cavalry Regiment cutting off Brigade La Paz along Interstate 8 west of Yuma, Arizona; the Mexican command begins to infiltrate its troops back across the border to avoid encirclement and elimination.

The Torres Motorized Cavalry Brigade's advance up the Interstate 25 corridor is halted south of the town of Truth or Consequences by dug-in troops who are (comparatively) well-equipped with anti-tank weapons and aggressively employed HMMWVs equipped with Mk-19 grenade launchers and machineguns. Brigade Ciudad Juarez and Brigade Torreon resume their advance, with the depleted Brigade Ciudad Juarez trailing the retreating School Brigade and Brigade Torreon headed east into the vastness of West Texas.

Confused fighting rages in Austin, Texas, with an ad-hoc American defense force (composed of armed civilians, troops from Fort Hood, stragglers from San Antonio and other battles to the south and Air Force personnel displaced from Bergstrom Air Force Base) tangling in yet more urban fighting against Mexican troops, who are growing increasingly desperate in their attempt to capture ground and supplies as word begins to trickle forward that the feeble trickle of supplies from home is going to be disrupted.

HQ, 4th Armored Division is disbanded. Each of the division's brigades become independent, reporting to their respective Corps headquarters (1st Brigade - 89 (my II) Corps in California, 2nd Brigade - VIII Corps in the Pacific Northwest and 3rd Brigade to 90 (my XIII) Corps in Texas).

In the American Midwest, the withdrawal of the first battalions of the 49th Armored Division for movement to the front has caused a wave of unrest, as local authorities are unable to provide the resources and stability the troops did and as various armed groups decide to take advantage of the rapidly developing security vacuum.

ROK mechanized troops and an American armor-heavy task force built around the 163rd Armored Cavalry Regiment (Montana National Guard) are in position to strike the flank of the Soviet force south of the DMZ. The 194th (my 67th) Motor-Rifle Division, in the lead, is depending on the 203rd (my 14th) Air Assault Brigade (reinforced with North Korean stragglers integrated into the elite paratroop force) to protect the exposed sides of the salient created by the attacking force. Morning fog provides partial protection from allied airpower.

Northwest of the fierce fighting for Heidelberg, the Soviet 62nd Tank Division (still badly depleted from its fighting in Erbach an der Donau in May and June despite an influx of T-34s and Uzbek teenagers) reaches the banks of the Neckar River on the outskirts of the ruined city of Mannheim. An aggressive young officer leads a team of dismounted motor-riflemen across the river, capturing the abutments of a partially-collapsed railroad bridge; by dusk division engineers are hastily reinforcing it to support heavy traffic.

The Hungarian 53rd Mechanized Brigade, slowly moving through eastern Siberia as it tries to make its way back home, has reached the town of Kemorovo. It has taken nearly a month to gather the fuel to move the formation a little over 300 miles, fighting occasional skirmishes against armed bands (and some local authorities that object to the Hungarians' passage).

[chico20854]

July 4, 1998

Nothing official today. Unofficially,

Americans are not in their usual celebratory mood on this, the 222nd anniversary of their nation's independence from Great Britain. Hundreds of thousands of troops are scattered in desperate combat around the world, including in five American states and in neighboring Canada, the first time America has been under land attack since the War of 1812. Millions have died in the prior year from Soviet nuclear attack and the side-effects of those strikes, and not a single citizen's life is unaffected. The government that was established in the 18th century has been, at least in theory temporarily, supplanted by a ruling council of senior military officers, and many areas are completely lawless.

Fighting in Los Angeles becomes more widespread as increasing numbers of Mexican criminal gangs, paratroops, marines and armored cavalrymen arrive in the ruined city. As with other areas of the front, the cessation of resupply (barely adequate and haphazard as it may have been) as a result of the nuclear attacks has had a perverse effect - Mexican troops need to continue their advance to capture food and fuel from the Americans; to remain in static positions is to to court disaster without resupply.

The troops facing the Torres Motorized Cavalry Brigade at the New Mexico town of Truth or Consequences are identified as USAF security police, the 1606th Security Police Group, reinforced with local militia and police. The Mexican rear area is suffering from pinprick attacks from the cadre of the USAF special operations school at Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque. To the east, Brigade Chihuahua is coming under increasing pressure as its strung-out infantry outposts, scattered over 450 miles of New Mexico and Texas, are cut off from resupply and attempting to deal with a largely hostile (and heavily armed) local population.

Grae notes that long hot dusty days are spent harvesting the winter red wheat in Nebraska to feed the nation in the coming year. Rail transportation moves the crops east to distribution points as best they can, given the poor state of the transportation network.

South Korean infantry (mostly reservists), liberally supported by Allied airpower, fights the advancing Soviet 194th (my 67th) Motor-Rifle Division to a halt on the outskirts of the ruins of Yongjiu, which was destroyed in the 1997 fighting. The effort presents an opportunity for the American 163rd Armored Cavalry Regiment (Montana National Guard) and South Korean 20th Infantry Division (Mechanized) to smash into the Soviet flank. The North Korean troops pressed into Soviet service drop their weapons and run, while the elite Soviet paratroops of the 203rd (my 14th) Air Assault Brigade seek to use the rough terrain and high ground to disrupt the armored counterattack.

The fighting in Macedonia escalates further, with the intertwined former allied Greek and Albanian units struggling to sort themselves out, defeat their opponents and form a coherent front line. Adding to the difficulty, both nations are struggling to sustain their forces in occupied Jugoslavia in the face of dire conditions at home - meaning that, despite the propaganda and exhortations coming from government mouthpieces, the troops at the front are starved of ammunition, fuel and the other supplies they need to sustain the fighting.

[chico20854]

July 5, 1998

(Unofficially) As another day of clear weather presents the pilots of attack aircraft with picture-perfect targeting opportunities, the Soviet drive across the DMZ falls apart. ROK infantry launch a counterattack out of Yungjiu while Allied armor slices through the Soviet rear, sweeping aside the resistance of the remaining Soviet paratroops of the 203rd (my 14th) Air Assault Brigade. (Officially) The Allied armored/mechanized force savagely mauls the enemy formations and forces them back across the border. It will prove to be the last major Soviet-led offensive of the war in Korea.

Unofficially,

The final transports arrive in the Mexican port of Altamira carrying troops and supplies for the Soviet Division Cuba. The crews of Soviet ships in the ragtag flotilla are drafted into service with the division, Major General Femorov accepting the risk that the experienced sailors he needs to continue his journey back home may be lost in combat, so desperate is the need for men for Division Cuba. Most of the Mexican vessels are abandoned as well, but the third-country ships (including the Bulgarian A.B. Buzko, the Polish Orlęta Lviv and the Greek Paraguay Express) begin scrounging fuel to return to sea rather than be stranded in Mexico. The Mexican naval authorities do what they can, securing some poorly refined crude that can be burned in the Bulgarian steamship's boilers.

Harold Thomas, leader of the refugee army forming west of Pittsburgh, tests out his force, which to date has been indifferently armed with whatever weapons individuals brought along with them. Thomas sets his sights on an isolated military facility - an Army Reserve regional vehicle maintenance center on Neville Island in the middle of the Ohio River downstream of downtown Pittsburgh. Since the deployment of the units the facility supported in peacetime, its staff (composed of civilian workers and soldiers medically disqualified from deployment) was reassigned to perform repair duties on seriously damaged vehicles evacuated to the US from combat zones around the world; the base was assigned as a repair center for M-750 armored cars and M35-series 2 1/2-ton trucks. He leads his ragtag force of desperate refugees (that many would characterize as marauders) in a multi-prong attack on the base, which straddles the middle of the long, narrow island and has been supported by river traffic since the nuclear strikes in November and December. As human waves of lightly-armed men assault from the landside, an "elite" force of Thomas' most loyal fighters crosses the river from the north bank in small boats. Fierce close-in fighting ensues, in which the Army personnel are overwhelmed. Thomas' group captures three operable M-750s and a dozen trucks as well as a healthy stockpile of parts, tools and damaged vehicles; the bodies of the expert mechanics needed to employ them, however, are scattered all around the plant, reducing the value of the prize. The armored cars have very little ammunition, and the biggest prize is the contents of the base's arms room, with three dozen M16s and five M60 machineguns as well as the machineguns for the M750s and the small arms wielded by the late employees.

A pre-dawn Mexican attack on the Marines in San Diego is partially successful; little ground is captured but the Marines lose several dozen men and expend increasingly scarce ammunition repelling the assault. The weather is too clear for any risky resupply flights to be flown.

89 (my II) Corps to the east is immobilized while awaiting additional fuel tankers to arrive; the force's Marines of Task Force Devil Dog ambush a Mexican patrol attempting to infiltrate behind the corps' lines through the broiling-hot Joshua Tree National Park.

In New Mexico and West Texas a strange calm reigns, with the retreating School Brigade, short on supplies and reliant on increasingly breakdown-prone civilian vehicles, attempting to make its way to friendly territory without a major clash with their Mexican opponents, who are equally reluctant to fight, given their poor supply situation and extreme dispersal.

Fighting in eastern Texas is increasingly confused as Mexican Army and allied criminal and biker gangs contest control of Austin; an informal force of snipers (all US Marine Corps veterans) ensconce themselves on the Texas Tower's 27th-floor observation deck, dominating the campus with accurate rifle fire. The 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment bypasses the city once again, passing through the city's eastern suburbs and looping west to block Interstate 35 once again. North of Houston, the Mexican Coastal Column is gradually spreading out, with individual regiments advancing north and east nearly independently, overrunning equally dispersed detachments of the ill-fated 46th Infantry Division.

In British Columbia, the 47th Infantry Division comes under coordinated attack by the 13th Guards Air Assault Division from the north and the 114th (my 202nd) Motor-Rifle Division from the west. While short of ammunition and fuel, the American infantry and their Canadian allies turn back the assault.

The 34th (my 14th) Tank Division, a category C unit that saw much action earlier in the war in China and Turkey, is shifted from occupation duty in Thrace under 14th Army's command to 5th Guards Army in Romania, where it is assigned to secure the Ukrainian-Romanian border west of the ruins of Odessa, keeping the two-way flow of supplies and petroleum with Romania secure.

Outside the northwestern Russian town of Volkhov, a group of three deserters from the 115th Guards Motor-Rifle Division take over an isolated farmhouse, taking the residents (an elderly couple and their teenage granddaughter) hostage, forcing them to cook for them as they rest and steal what few valuables the locals possess. The couple's 12-year old grandson, who was out hunting when the deserters arrived, notices that something is wrong and hides in the woods to observe. Seeing the armed deserter, the boy flees to town and alerts the local MVD security troops.

[chico20854]

July 6, 1998

Nothing official for the day. Unofficially,

A fierce battle erupts in Duluth, Minnesota between a semi-official militia (led by a former sheriff's deputy, his family and a group of younger members of the town's VFW post) and a group of desperate refugees from the Twin Cities that have been sheltering at the nearby Jay Cooke State Park, who are trying to seize control of a grain elevator in the town's port. The storage facility contains nearly 3.5 million bushels of grain harvested late in 1997 that has been stranded in the port by the frozen Lake Superior and the breakdown in transportation. The refugees assault is repelled, but the militia has sustained heavy losses in the defense.

After two weeks of training, the first Mexican Army independent Voluntarios companies are declared combat ready. Ten companies are dispatched to each army operating in American territory under command of junior officers, many seconded from the Rural Guard force. Privately, many surviving senior officers in Mexico City figure they are sending the barely trained soldiers, most of whom were civilians less than three weeks ago, to their death if they were to face US Army troops. Unbeknownst to them, however, a group of generals within the Ministry of Defense have coordinated with senior PRI politicians, who see the Voluntarios as a useful way to reduce the population of impoverished people that would otherwise threaten instability under the pressures of economic collapse and American nuclear attack.

The transport USS Frederick is dispatched from Port Hueneme back to the San Diego area carrying supplies and another LAV-25. It is escorted by the light frigate USS Joyce and the Coast Guard cutter Chase, detached from the USS Oriskany group in San Francisco Bay.

In the San Diego fighting, the Marine's last remaining armored vehicle, a LAV-25 brought in by helicopter, is destroyed when one of 1st Mechanized Brigade's remaining ten AMX-13s catches it dashing from cover to cover, ripping it apart with a 90mm high explosive round. Mexican troops have established a foothold in the recruit training area, having crossed under cover of darkness and smoke. The Marines launch a furious counterattack but, low on ammunition, are unable to drive them out; they reluctantly resort to lighting the barracks the Mexicans have seized partial control of on fire, withdrawing the remaining friendly troops and using the previously meticulously maintained landscape in between as a kill zone.

A patrol from the battle-scarred New Mexico Military Institute links up with a scouting party from the withdrawing School Brigade west of Artesia. The cadets inform the Army unit that the nearby town (and its supplies of food and fuel from nearby oil wells) is held by two companies of Brigade Chihuahua's 35th Infantry Regiment and informal Mexican auxiliary troops and allied gangsters.

Fighting continues to rage in Austin, with the Mexican advance essentially halted by American resistance, disorganized as it is.

Troops of the 62nd Tank Division are able to break out of their bridgehead on the north side of the Neckar River in the ruins of Mannheim; the division's engineers restore the shattered railroad bridge enough for the unit's T-34s and T-55s to cross over as the division's troops race north. 1st Southwestern Front gives the formation priority of supply, ordering the rest of the front's troops to keep up pressure on NATO troops elsewhere along the line.

Allied troops in South Korea sweep the area evacuated by retreating North Korean and Soviet troops, hoping to identify any booby traps left behind, salvage weapons and ammunition and ensure that no stragglers, deserters or stay-behind parties are operating in the area.

A squad of MVD troops from the Volkhov garrison surround the farmhouse outside town that has been taken over by a group of three deserters from the 115th Guards Motor-Rifle Division. The squad leader calls for them to come out; one does so and is arrested but his two compatriots refuse, holding three civilians hostage.

[chico20854]

July 7, 1998

Canon is silent on the day. Unofficially,

Fighting is now widespread throughout the Los Angeles basin; while there are no defined front lines Mexican forces have overrun the Seal Beach Naval Weapons Station and are carefully navigating the less-heavily-damaged corridor between the Torrance and Carson refinery nuclear strikes.

After a hard overnight's steam, the small American task force of the USS Frederick, the USS Joyce and the USCG Chase arrive off of San Diego. The Chase's helicopter is able to drop a sling load of ammunition and food in an open area between burning Marine barracks before briefly hovering to pick up five wounded Marines. It takes heavy Mexican fire as it departs over the international airport. Despite this, it returns to the area an hour later, accompanied by another HH-65 from the Joyce. This mission brings in more food and water as well as three corpsmen from the ships who volunteer to remain ashore assisting the wounded. The helicopters once again take heavy fire, forcing the commander of the Frederic to delay beaching his LST or landing boats until after dark.

In eastern California, 89 (my II) Corps is still immobilized by lack of fuel; water supplies for the troops in the 120+ degree heat are also a vital logistical concern. Brigade LaPaz has almost completely withdrawn from American territory, shifting west to come to the aid of Brigade Mexicali.

Brigade Chihuahua's garrison in Artesia, New Mexico is crushed by a predawn American attack. The cadets of the New Mexico Military Institute attack the town from the north, while three battalions of the School Brigade (the 2nd, 3rd and 6th Battalions, 56th Air Defense Artillery), reinforced with the veteran gunners of the Air Defense School, attack from the south, east and west, respectively. The 300 or so Mexican defenders last less than 45 minutes before the Americans have restored control of the town.

The Mexican Coastal Column's effort in eastern Texas has proven spectacularly successful, with the 46th Infantry Division disintegrating under relentless, widely dispersed attacks. The success comes at the cost of the gradual dissolution of the Mexican force, as it spreads out over an ever-increasing area in pursuit of fleeing American troops and resources.

The Soviet assault on Prince George, British Columbia, defended by the 47th Infantry Division and remnants of the Canadian 39th Brigade, resumes. This time, the Soviets launch numerous dismounted infantry assaults, forcing the 47th to commit its reserves. With Allied troops and reserves suitably tied up, the Soviet hammer blow falls, with the 114th (my 202nd) Motor-Rifle Division dispatching its 414th Tank Regiment, down to 32 T-55s accompanied by a half-dozen BTR-50s and several dozen riflemen clinging to the turret sides, cross-country to cut the defenders off from the south.

Soviet tanks and troops rush north through the Dead Zone north of Mannheim, opposed only by scattered detachments of German territorials, reaching Darmstadt by sundown. The commander of SOUTHAG orders NATO troops south of the Main (mostly in the Heidelberg area) to evacuate behind that barrier, taking advantage of the rough terrain to the east of the Dead Zone.

The Bulgarian freighter A.B. Buzko departs the Mexican port of Altamira; having received decent treatment while in Cuba and low on fuel, the ship's captain decides to head to the port of Cienfuegos on Cuba's southern coast.

In the early morning hours, the teenage girl held hostage by a pair of deserters outside Volkhov, Russia emerges from the farmhouse, escorted by one of the men. A MVD sniper shoots at the deserter, killing him with one shot, and the girl flees. The remaining desperado remains in the cabin, killing the elderly couple inside before the MVD troopers can rush in and overwhelm him. The troops execute him on the spot.

[chico20854]

July 8, 1998

The replica USS Constitution departs the Azores, its crew swelled with the addition of American servicemen (some Navy and Air Force personnel effectively abandoned there, others that escaped Eastern Europe, in an incredible saga, in Greek fishing boats). The ship is also carrying paying passengers, 40 French school girls and their teacher.

Unofficially,

Division Cuba begins the process of expanding from a motor-rifle brigade to a division. An census is performed of the military advisors and civilian technicians evacuated alongside the 7th Motor-Rifle Brigade to assess their skills and rank (if any), while the brigade commander sits down with General Femerov to discuss his subordinate commanders. A process is identified - to the extent that the advisor pool can supply qualified officers (such as motor-rifle colonels and lieutenant colonels), it will be relied on to provide leaders for the expanded unit. (The basic plan is to take the existing motor-rifle brigade and increase the size of each element - the BMP battalion, for example, will become a BMP regiment; if a suitable colonel cannot be identified the existing battalion commander will become the regimental commander, while if experienced majors or lieutenant colonels cannot be tasked to serve as battalion commanders some or all of the company commanders will be promoted to major and given the job. This evaluation is carried out division-wide.) Advisors and civilian technicians that can be assigned staff or support jobs are assigned appropriately, while the rest (such as many of the sailors from the transport fleet) are handed over to the 7th Brigade's sergeants to be trained up as motor-riflemen, tank drivers or artillery privates.

While fighting in Los Angeles continues to be intense, the troops of 63 (my XVI) Corps are gradually finding themselves outnumbered by the ever-increasing numbers of Mexican forces, while the daily deliveries of ammunition are growing smaller. While the MPs of the 221st MP Brigade and the teens of the 10th California Cadet Brigade are attempting to secure the rear area, the corps' supply columns are coming under more frequent attack.

The appearance of Soviet armor in the 47th Infantry Division's rear causes considerable distress, especially since it has been months since the war-weary National Guard division received a resupply of anti-tank weapons. Many squads are down to just a single LAW and the division's cavalry squadron, the 1st Squadron, 194th Cavalry, which has been set up as the division's anti-tank reserve, has eight TOW missiles remaining, the last ATGMs in the entire 47th. (The Canadians, composed of reserve units, are equally devoid of anti-tank weapons). The commanding general radios to Fort Lewis seeking any assistance that can be provided; in the interim the Allied troops hunker down and prepare for a siege of Prince George.

Under cover of a smokescreen laid by its escorts, the American LST USS Frederick makes a run for shore in San Diego with a load of vitally needed supplies. The attempt goes disastrously wrong, with Mexican troops ashore taking the ship's bridge under fire, inflicting massive losses on the command crew. The ship broaches, turned parallel to the beach by the waves, which then rock the ship back and forth, digging its hull into the sand. The sand kicked up by the transport's props as the chief engineer desperately tries to free the ship gets sucked into the engine's cooling water intakes, forcing the propulsion system to be cut back lest the filters clog. As the tide comes in the ship remains stuck and it takes more and more enemy fire, despite the efforts of the hovering escorts to support it.

In Duluth, Minnesota the refugees make a second assault on the downtown port's grain elevator; this time the assault force advances behind the cover of a mass of children and teenagers from the refugee camp established at the nearby state park campground. The remaining defenders are reluctant to open fire on the children, allowing the armed and desperate men seeking shelter among them to advance to within striking range. The teens, worked into a frenzy by the deceptive teachings of the camp leaders, savagely beat the remaining militiamen to death as they overrun the grain elevator.

The NATO defenders of Heidelberg try to slip away in the fog of the early morning hours, crossing the few remaining bridges before the opposing Soviets realize they are leaving.

In the Balkans, the reforming Jugoslav Army has in many cases swept Soviet occupation forces out of the mountains of Bosnia, reaching the banks of the Sava River, where they pause to distribute the vast quantities of captured and abandoned Soviet kit and integrate reinforcements. Their opponents in the various puppet armed forces are trying equally hard to increase their strength.

[chico20854]

July 9, 1998

Nothing in canon for the day. Unofficially,

Under the protection of the 36th Engineer Group (Construction) and using power from a half dozen hydropower plants in the region, one reactor of the Watts Bar Nuclear Power Plant in eastern Tennessee is restarted. The power is carefully rationed to support food and war production and further support reconstruction efforts.

In British Columbia, the 47th Infantry Division receives partial salvation from the sky. The generals calls for help have been answered with a single sortie of a F-111A from the 366th Tactical Fighter Wing's 4007th Combat Crew Training Squadron, flying from Mountain Home Air Force Base, Montana. The bomber drops a single B61 tactical nuclear bomb on the Soviet tank regiment, disrupting its command and control as well as destroying several tanks and unprotected personnel. (The attack is widely considered the only NATO nuclear attack on Canadian territory.) The American division commander, who had no prior notice of the incoming strike, orders an immediate withdrawal, unfortunately through the fallout plume of the nuclear strike. The Soviet troops to the north and west launch an immediate attack, and the withdrawal becomes a rout, with disorganized columns of American troops streaming south, with scattered Soviet detachments in pursuit.

The Army in the United States is making progress in its rushed effort to convert training divisions to light infantry divisions. While in theory there could be a uniform process, in reality it is much more complicated. Each division, composed of basic, advanced and one-station (combined) training battalions, has a unique mix of specialties it instructs - the 70th Division turns out infantry recruits, while the 76th trains combat engineers and the 85th cavalry scouts and tankers, with appropriate allocations of training equipment and appropriate instructors. Transforming an infantry training battalion to an infantry battalion is comparatively simple, but converting an engineering training battalion to an artillery one (and finding any quantity of artillery for it to operate) is a much more complicated effort. Nevertheless, so dire is the situation that officers throughout the Army's embattled training command are putting in long hours planning and executing the conversions.

The 63 (my XVI) Corps commander takes the drastic step of limiting resupply convoys south of the Hollywood Hills to nighttime only, so intense are the ongoing attacks on them in prior days. American troops begin to retreat northward through Los Angeles County, abandoning their remaining positions south of Interstate 105, which hopefully can serve as a wide dead zone that can be covered by automatic weapons fire.

A single CH-53E flight makes it into San Diego in the early morning hours, dropping off water, 5.56mm ammo, grenades and canned food; it is to prove the last resupply flight into the embattled garrison. The surrounded Marines also attempt to salvage the supplies from the beached USS Frederick, but the open ground between the garrison's remaining territory and the beach is too dangerous to cross. The ship's crew and the Marines mutually reinforce each other but unable to establish a secure link. Brigade Ensenada has managed to expand its positions within the depot's central recruit training area, with fighting devolving into hand-to-hand struggles at ultra-short range.

The drive of the Torres Motorized Cavalry Brigade north along Interstate 25 towards Albuquerque has effectively come to a halt, the Mexican artillery out of ammunition and the entire force short of spare parts, fuel and ammunition needed to maneuver around the US Air Force blocking force at Truth or Consequences. The Mexican commander, well aware of the existence of the massive nuclear weapon stockpile at Albuquerque's Kirtland Air Force Base, is reluctant to exert too much pressure on the defenders lest they decide to separate him into his constituent atoms.

A group of 18 bikers from the Ataúdos biker gang, offered a reward of five kilos of marijuana seized from the Austin Police Department evidence room, storm the University of Texas Tower, killing the Marine veteran snipers that have held up Mexican control of the capital city. (One of the ex-Marines is thrown over the parapet to her death).

The veteran 20th Tank Division locates and exploits a gap in the NATO line along the Main River near Frankfurt and, in one of the war’s last river crossing operations, throws troops across.

The masters of the mass of miscellaneous NATO naval and merchant vessels gathered in Loch Ewe, Scotland hold a conference to determine what their next steps should be. The supply of fuel in the fuel depot ashore, which had been refilled in the weeks and months following the Battle of the Norwegian Sea, has been largely depleted, burned by the generators keeping life aboard the ships possible. The local population ashore, in one of the most remote areas of the Scottish Highlands (who were only connected by road to the rest of the UK during the Second World War), is too small to produce nearly enough food to support the sailors on the ships. The decision is reached to dispense the remaining fuel to naval combatants that are still seaworthy, reserving a portion for some of the merchantmen, which will transport the crews back home, at least one ship for each of the NATO nations and others to transport citizens of neutral countries (the many Filipinos, for example) home

[chico20854]

July 10, 1998

In the Battle in Pittsburgh, Washington Militia control of the southern portion of the city is challenged when a powerful and heavily armed marauder force under Harold Thomas crosses the Monongahela from downtown Pittsburgh on the Liberty, Smithfield, and Fort Pitt bridges. They are temporarily held up by automatic weapons fire from the heights across the river but manage at last to reach the cover of the Fort Pitt and Liberty Tunnels under Mount Washington and emerge on the south side of that steep-sloped ridge. From there, they are able to climb the slopes of Mount Washington and trap the militia defenders against the nearly vertical bluffs above the river. In a heroic stand, the outnumbered Washington Militia, under the command of former Marine Major Jason Fairbanks, hold the vastly superior enemy forces at bay into the night.

Unofficially,

The Soviet pursuit of the retreating American 47th Infantry Division falters as the supply of fuel dries up. The first contingents of the 47th Infantry Division cross the border back into American territory shortly before midnight.

The Mexican 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment disrupts the 63 (my XVI) Corps defense of LA when it appears in the San Gabriel Valley, having passed through Pomona largely unopposed. The American commander hastily redeploys the 221st Military Police Brigade to throw up a defensive line, but the MPs are short of heavy weapons and the move leaves supply convoys dangerously exposed to attack by the numerous groups of armed irregulars operating in the confused and crowded rear area. The move causes the 6th Army command, operating from a forward headquarters in Bakersfield, to divert more scarce resources away from 89 (my II) Corps to the southeast, which is secure in its positions around Palm Springs and have the eastern column of 2nd Mexican Army contained.

With the capture of the dominating Texas Tower in Austin, the Mexican attackers begin to gain the upper hand in the fighting for Texas' capital city. The Coastal Column, which is now approaching Tyler in northeast Texas, is losing focus and slowing dramatically as the flow of supplies from the rear has ceased, cut off by American nuclear strikes on the rail network and eaten up by the distance from the border.

The 8th Special Forces Group in Chiapas undertakes its first direct action mission alongside its indigenous allies. The American-led guerilla force attacks an outpost of Brigade Tapachula, a force that has already been battered by American airstrikes. The detachment also establishes a pair of observation posts along the Guatemalan border, watching for truck traffic crossing into Mexico carrying vitally needed fuel from Guatemala's refinery, one of the few remaining in operation in this area of the world.

8th Tank Army has been fed into the line south of Frankfurt, allowing 41st Army’s remaining forces to pursue the retreating NATO troops from Heidelberg. 8th Tank Army's 523rd Pontoon Battalion deploys ferries, transporting the T-86s and BMPs of the 20th Tank Division's 76th Guards Tank Regiment to reinforce the dismounted motor riflemen that crossed the prior day. The border guards of the German 4th GrenzJaeger Division, lacking anti-tank weapons, break and run. The Soviets pursue, but the ferries are unable to bring more than a trickle of armored vehicles across at a time. Attempts to have the BMPs and BTRs swim across are halted after it is discovered that most vehicles have damage that defeated their watertight integrity and that watertight seals in their hulls have become brittle with age. By dark most of the division’s 70 tanks and 4500 soldiers have crossed the river, leaving the artillery regiment, rear services and most of the soft-skinned vehicles on the south bank.

[chico20854]

July 11, 1998

In Pittsburgh, a relief column from the Route 70 bridge arrives and hits the marauders from behind. The marauder forces are crushed on the south flank of Mount Washington and Thomas himself is killed. Perhaps one in ten of the attackers manage to escape back across the river, and the power of the marauder bands in Allegheny County is temporarily broken.

Unofficially,

The first five companies of Voluntarios arrive in the rear areas of the 2nd, 3rd and 4th Armies. The generals are somewhat baffled what to do with the poorly trained and equipped troops. 2nd Army, having taken heavy losses in the Battle of San Diego, sends them to the front to fill out the battered Brigade Ensenada and 1st Mechanized Brigade while 3rd Army assigns its contingent to secure the ruins of El Paso and patrol the vulnerable Interstate 25 supply line that the Torres Motorized Cavalry Brigade is dependent on. 4th Army uses them to patrol its vast rear area, home to a hostile and heavily armed civilian population.

The 63 (my XVI) Corps position in Los Angeles is in a precarious state as Mexican troops sweep in from the northwest, as the armored cavalry seeks weak points in the 221st MP Brigade's thinly-spread hasty defense. Mexican paratroops and marines and allied irregular armed groups press forward against positions held by the 40th Infantry Division (-), driving the last American defenders north of Interstate 10.

In San Diego, the defending Marines, who are growing increasingly short of ammunition, are unable to prevent Mexican troops from crossing the Recruit Depot's hallowed Parade Deck, being driven out of many of the buildings that overlook the large open space.

The School Brigade and its local allies, the (reduced but now battle-hardened) cadets and cadre of the New Mexico Military Institute, are still located in the town of Artesia, New Mexico following their successful attack on the isolated Mexican garrison there. The Army formation expended the last of its fuel reaching the city and many of the civilian and commercial vehicles that made the trek from Fort Bliss have been nearly destroyed by the rough conditions. The brigade commander is able to make contact with higher headquarters after nearly a month without a reliable radio link; his maintainers are working with the town's mechanics to determine what vehicles can be repaired for further travel, which should be cannibalized and what vehicles in town can be requisitioned for further service. In the latter effort, the priorities are for ruggedness and off-road capability, diesel power and commonality of parts within the fleet. While the local Permian Basin is continuing to produce a trickle of oil, there are no refining facilities, so the town works with the brigade's troops to establish a crude distillation tower, which can boil crude and separate it into very rough approximations of gasoline, diesel, kerosene and fuel oil.

In the early morning hours, reinforcing German troops from VI Korps take up positions surrounding the Soviet 20th Tank Division's positions north of the Main River, containing the bridgehead south of the A66 autobahn. At dawn a flight of German PAH-1 attack helicopters from the 1st Army Aviation Command, using the unit’s last remain stocks of fuel and HOT missiles, attacks the Soviet crossing site, sinking all of the 523rd's PMP and GSP ferries. The helicopters then call in an artillery strike on the marshalling area on the south bank and the egress points on the north shore, which use the last of the 4th PanzerGrenadier Division’s stockpile of FASCAM munitions as well as significant amounts of high explosive; the strikes have the effect of cutting the forces on the north shore off from the south.

The Bulgarian freighter A.B. Buzko arrives in Cienfuegos, Cuba after transporting Soviet troops of Division Cuba to Mexico.

[chico20854]

July 12, 1998

Nothing official for today. Unofficially,

The inhabitants of the refugee camp at Duluth's Jay Cook State Park, Minnesota, having gained control of a grain elevator containing nearly 3.5 million bushels of grain are dismayed when the "leadership council" of the camp declares that it is assuming essentially dictatorial control of the camp and city, using the combination of the weapons captured from the town militia and the ability to grant or withhold food as their means of control.

As conditions grow increasingly desperate in the San Diego Marine perimeter, the two remaining naval combatants offshore, the light frigate USS Joyce and the Coast Guard cutter Chase, which have nearly expended their entire onboard ammunition supplies providing support, use the last of their aviation fuel supplies to fly a series of evacuation flights, bringing out the wounded, even those that would be considered lightly wounded and still fit for action. The flights bring out approximately 150 men. By sundown, the Marines have been pushed into a single building, the Recruit Training Regiment headquarters building, Lejeune Hall.

Fighting swirls throughout Los Angeles as 63 (my XVI) Corps' front line is reduced to a series of independent isolated positions unable to control territory beyond range of their guns. Patrols come under attack from an array of Mexican units, allied gangs and various bandit groups, all intent on looting the wealth of America's biggest city. In Texas, the city of Austin is similarly engulfed in widespread citywide fighting, with no front line as it becomes increasingly difficult to discriminate between attacking American (and allied) forces and fighting for plunder. North of the city, the Mexicans approach Fort Hood, which is defended by the 95th Training Division.

US Air Force security troops, reinforced with local armed civilians, attempt to dislodge the Mexican Torres Motorized Cavalry Brigade from its positions outside Truth or Consequences, New Mexico. The attempt fails when the Mexicans deploy mobile reserves to reinforce the threatened sector; the American troops lack fire support heavier than 81mm mortars and Mk-19 grenade launchers.

Two new Soviet divisions arrive at the front in Germany - the 122nd (my 66th Guards Training) Motor-Rifle (assigned to 41st Army) and the 106th (my 232nd) Motor-Rifle (assigned to 16th Army). Despite this, Soviet forces remain short on infantry.

21st Army, on the former East German-Czechoslovakian border, reinforces the efforts of its Czech allies to the west, launching an attack with the Category A 102nd Guards (my 254th) Motor-Rifle Division against the American XV Corps. The attack hits the outer defensive line of the 3rd Infantry Division (Mechanized), the Soviet tanks forced to halt their advance and provide fire support to engineers called forward to clear lanes through the defensive minefields; the T-80s too valuable to be used as improvised mine-clearing vehicles.

The Panamanian bulk carrier Seaway Ace, sailing to France with a cargo of Argentinian grain, is sunk by a torpedo from the Soviet Victor III-class nuclear attack submarine 60 Let Shefstva VLKSM.

Italian recovery crews are nearly finished in their efforts to restore operation of the Sonico hydropower plant north of Verona.

In Jugoslavia, the JSA’s engineering cadre (long-service prewar engineer officers and professional NCOs) of Group Vrbas have been able to locate sufficient equipment from the confused masses of abandoned vehicles and organize enough troops to repair a damaged bridge over the Sava at Bosanska Gradiška. The Group's infantry, who crossed over by raft in prior days, drive off the small garrison of the Italian-allied Croatian Nationalist Army

[chico20854]

July 13, 1998

Nothing in canon for today. Unofficially,

STAVKA orders the commander of the Yalu Front to arrest the commander of the Soviet 35th Army, deciding that the recent failure of the attack across the DMZ was the result of his collaboration with Allied forces. The Front commander decides to ignore such a ridiculous order, confident that STAVKA has little recourse to his insubordination.

The first barges carrying troops of the 49th Armored Division (Texas National Guard) arrive in Muskogee, Oklahoma, as far along the Red River and as close as the riverways can get the unit to the rally point it has been ordered to, Fort Sill in south-central Oklahoma.

The end finally arrives for the Marines defending the San Diego Recruit Depot, with the last structure under American control, the Recruit Training Regiment headquarters in Lejeune Hall ablaze and under unrelenting attack. The 400 remaining Marines, a mix of partially trained recruits (now seasoned veterans), their drill instructors and other cadre and other staff from the base, surrender to the commanding general of the 1st Mechanized Brigade. As the guns finally fall silent, the American ships offshore turn north, heading for the nearest friendly naval base at Port Hueneme.

In northeastern Texas, the Mexican drive has come to a halt as the flow of supplies from Mexico has completely ended, a hostile local population requires large numbers of troops to subdue. While organized American resistance has evaporated, the so-called Coastal Column has spread out over hundreds of square miles of territory and, short of ammunition, fuel and replacements and is unable to undertake further offensive action.

Throughout the day, more small-scale attacks and incursions on the Soviet 20th tank Division's lines deplete the Soviet ammunition supplies, wear out the troops and force the unit to deploy its remaining armored vehicles to reinforce threatened areas, draining their gas tanks. After dark, German jaegers and dismounted panzergrenadiers slip in between the Soviet positions.

The 102nd Guards (my 254th) Motor-Rifle Division's troops breach the 1st Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division's minefields and push the 66th Tank Regiment forward, with the BMP-mounted 95th Motor-Rifle Regiment in close support, all under an artillery barrage. The resulting battle sees the brigade's tank battalion (2nd Battalion, 64th Armor, which has absorbed the remnants of the brigade's other armor battalion, the 3rd Battalion 64th Armor) and reinforcements from the 4th Squadron, 4th Cavalry rushed forward to halt the breakthrough, while overhead an air battle rages as both sides seek local air superiority.

JSA engineers along the Sava, in preparation for the force's breakout from the mountains of Bosnia-Hercegovina, secure two more crossings over the Sava River, at Bosanski Šamac and Badovinci. Both crossings are at or near pre-war bridges and follow skirmishes which have driven off local collaborationist militias.

The replica USS Constitution is intercepted in the Bay of Biscay by the French destroyer La Galissonnière; after boarding and inspection the sailing ship is permitted to continue to Brest.

In the Persian Gulf region, the remnants of the USS Independence's A-6 attack bomber fleet, consolidated in a single squadron VA-185, flies a deep strike mission. Taking off from the airfield at Bushehr in the early morning darkness, six A-6Fs fly at low level across the Zagros mountains deep into Kurdistan, where friendly guerillas have located a 7th Army logistic site. The flight, led by LtCdr Mark Winslow, drops nearly 25 tons of high explosive on the site, setting off numerous secondary explosions and depriving the Soviet force of months' worth of carefully hoarded supplies.

[chico20854]

July 14, 1998

Father Wojiech Niekarz forms the Wojsko Ludowa (People's Army) to free Poland of all outsiders.

Unofficially,

The conflict between Mexico and the US has rapidly evolved in the 32 days since Mexican troops first crossed the border. The poor logistical readiness of the Mexican Army, fierce American resistance and the nuclear strikes on the rail lines connecting the fighting forces with central Mexico have combined to starve Mexican troops of much of their fighting power. The attack on the Mexican Ministry of Defense and pinprick strikes throughout southern Mexico have further limited the amount of effort Mexican authorities can devote to the fighting in the north; the combination of all these factors as well as fatigue and declining combat power cause the struggle to take on (for both sides) a nature somewhere between conventional medium-intensity warfare and counterinsurgency. The Joint Chiefs, assessing the situation, determine that additional nuclear strikes in Mexican territory are unlikely to have a significant effect on the outcome of the fighting, and the large-scale use of tactical nuclear weapons needed to drive Mexican troops from American territory is impractical in the conditions, even if they were comfortable with the concept of using nuclear weapons on American territory. (They are not.)

In California, the center of gravity of the fighting has shifted northward with the collapse of American resistance in San Diego. (In that city, small bands and even individual Marines who survived the battle and evaded capture begin moving north and east, out of areas actively patrolled by Mexican troops and their criminal allies). It is another day of confused fighting in Los Angeles, with American troops under attack from all directions as Mexican troops and allies slip through the porous American front line.

Vicious short-range firefights rage throughout the 20th Tank Division's sector and by noon a steady stream of demoralized Soviet soldiers are fleeing back to and across the Main, abandoning their vehicles and many of their wounded or dead comrades.

The Soviet breakthrough in the US 3rd Infantry Division sector is brought to a rapid halt with the deployment of a trio of M422 eight-inch tactical nuclear rounds fired across the width of the Soviet breakthrough sector by the guns of the 209th Field Artillery Brigade. Elsewhere along the front the Soviet offensive peters to a halt in the face of rising NATO resistance.

The final Jugoslav crossings of the Sava River are initiated with the opening of ferry service at Slavonski Brod and the completion of a pontoon bridge at Sisak, Croatia.

In the wale of the prior day's airstrikes, the Soviet 7th Army instructs its subordinate units to preserve what supplies they have on hand while increasing "local provisioning", a euphemism for seizing needed food and fuel from the local population.

[chico20854]

July 15, 1998

The replica USS Constitution arrives in Brest, France and discharges passengers.

Unofficially,

A hodgepodge collection of trucks, both military and requisitioned civilian heavy vehicles (often with their drivers), is assembled in Muskogee, Oklahoma along with a fleet of iconic yellow school buses to transport the troops and equipment of the 3rd Brigade, 49th Armored Division the 225 miles to Fort Sill.

In southern Mexico, the Green Berets of the 8th Special Forces Group step up their activity levels, forcing the local military forces to expend more resources in tracking down the elusive American commandos.

The front in Germany has generally stabilized along the line Fulda-Frankfurt. Western TVD does not have the combat or logistic strength to continue the assault and behind the lines is struggling to absorb the territory it had seized, extend its supply system to reach the new front line and send what little replacement troops and equipment it receives forward. Likewise, the slapdash NATO defense has barely succeeded but has left units hopelessly intermixed and disorganized and expended most of the remaining stocks, leaving the German, British and American units in no condition to go over to the offense. In addition, the surviving NATO command staff has a more ambitious plan to drive the Warsaw Pact out of southern Germany and possibly liberate Austria.

The American 3rd Infantry Division (Mechanized) launches local counterattacks against the elements of the Soviet 102nd (my 254th) Motor-Rifle Division that were isolated by the prior days tactical nuclear strike along the route of the Soviet breakthrough. Isolated Soviet troops fight with a desperation seen all too often by NATO troops in Europe, taking many "fine American boys with them as they fight to the death.

The Italian-allied Croatian Nationalist Army ramps up its recruitment effort, sweeping men and boys off the streets of Zagreb and provincial towns as it furiously tries to hobble together a force sufficient to halt the advancing JSA, which is emerging from its strongholds in the Balkan Mountains and gaining strength daily as it too gathers recruits to man the weapons and armored vehicles abandoned by Soviet forces in the aftermath of the nuclear exchange.

An air assault by members of the 9th Infantry Division's 2nd Battalion, 1st Infantry attacks the home base of a group of 250 marauders, mostly IPA deserters, 100 km north of Kazerun. With the support of helicopter gunships and fire by the division's artillery the attack is a success and few of the bandits escape capture by the American troops; the Iranians are arrested by a small detachment of the Iranian National Security Force while Soviets are treated as POWs and any Western deserters are placed under arrest by the battalion commander.

[chico20854]

July 16, 1998

Nothing official for the day. Unofficially,

In southern Arizona Brigade Nogales has received three companies of Voluntarios from its home state of Sonora. The contingent includes several miners, men with great experience in using explosives, who quickly identify the potential to protect the brigade from American counterattack from the east through blocking the roads through the Santa Rita and Patagonia mountains with the careful application of demolitions. Semi-permanently blocking the handful of routes through the mountains would force the 111th Military Intelligence Brigade to either advance overland across the rugged desert terrain or undertake a long march north into the Tucson area to face the Mexican force. The brigade's commanding general gives the order for the effort to be undertaken as quickly as possible.

63 (my XVI) Corps in Los Angeles orders two simultaneous, and somewhat contradictory, orders. The main effort of the corps' defense is to shift northward, abandoning the Los Angeles basin to attempt to hold the Santa Monica mountains; the reinforcing 196th Infantry Brigade is directed to sweep eastward across the San Fernando Valley to drive the main body of Mexican troops back to Burbank, where a more defensible line can hopefully be established. Simultaneously, the corps' troops are to engage in aggressive patrolling into the Los Angeles basin, taking whatever opportunities can be found to attack isolated groups of Mexican troops and their allies.

The Soviet commander of 2nd Southwestern Front, at the western end of the long front line that stretches from the Baltic to the Rhine, orders a temporary pause in offensive operations to allow his battered command to resupply and absorb reinforcements (should any arrive) before resuming their offensive. Soviet troops and their Italian, Czech and Hungarian allies begin digging defensive positions to protect them against any NATO counterattack.

On the other side of the lines, Allied commanders are in no condition to launch an immediate counterattack. While a trickle of reinforcements and supplies are arriving in the theater, the Soviet offensive has forced the expenditure of much of the materiel that survived the long, cold winter and the relative bounty of supplies extracted from the French as compensation for their seizure of the Rhineland.

The highest intensity fighting the day sees in Europe, in fact, is between the French occupation forces and a patrol of Dutch Marines who have infiltrated into occupied Holland as part of the Dutch government's effort to demonstrate that they are not acquiescing to the Franco-Belgian occupation of significant portion of their country. The elite Dutch marines' ambush of a French patrol is masterful, as is the ambush they have emplaced to deal with the inevitable French reaction force. As is often the case in the Dutch insurgent struggle, the tide turns with the arrival of French aircraft overhead, forcing their retreat before they are able to overrun the kill zone and grab supplies, prisoners and intelligence.

The Italian 5th Corps begins withdrawing troops from the areas it occupies, turning responsibility for maintaining order to its local puppet forces - the Croatian Nationalist Army, the Liberated Slovenian Armed Forces (LSAF) and the Serbian National Army (SNA). The Italians leave a single brigade in each republic's capital to ensure the loyalty of the local puppet regimes, allowing the excess troops to be returned to assist in rebuilding shattered Italy or support the offensive in southern Germany. They provide limited logistic support, ironically, consisting of abandoned Soviet equipment as well as stocks of Jugoslav weapons that had been captured by the Italians during their conquest of Jugoslavia.

The Shiraz state munitions plant in Iran expands its production of ammunition following the reactivation of a brass shell casing press, relieving the IPA from dependence on reloading scavenged brass. It does, however, crease a need for some other source of brass, much of which turns out to be scavenged from not only the battlefield but also the civilian economy.

[chico20854]

July 17, 1998

Another day with nothing in the canon. Unofficially,

The Butler, Pennsylvania-area biker gang the Blackhawk Bike Club, running low on food, attacks the "Akron " Refugee Camp outside of the hamlet of West Sunbury. Depending on the terror effect of his gang's screaming motorcycles, its leader Grunge McLeod is able to subdue the camp's ragtag defensive force and seize over a hundred pounds of food, enough to sustain the gang for several weeks.

2nd Brigade, 40th Infantry Division launches an armored raid deep into Mexican-held territory in Los Angeles. A battalion task force of the 2nd Battalion, 185th Armor Regiment (two companies of M60A4 tanks, a platoon of M728 CEVs and a M113-mounted infantry company from the 2nd Battalion, 160th Infantry) performs a "Thunder Run" - a slow but steady convoy movement forward through Mexican lines in Century City, through the ruins of Beverly Hills (destroyed in the rioting that followed the nuclear strikes in November) to the La Brea neighborhood, before turning west on a parallel course to return to its start lines on Interstate 405 near the UCLA campus. The raid is executed with guns blazing; the overwhelming firepower of the tanks unleashed at the slightest sign of resistance induces panic among the scattered Mexican Army and allied elements that dare allow themselves to be spotted.

Mexican Voluntarios assigned to Brigade Nogales detonate 100 kg of dynamite (seized from local mines and ranches), blocking Arizona highway 82 in the remote canyon northeast of the small town of Patagonia. Following the explosion they begin constructing defensive positions in the hills overlooking the rubble pile.

After a month of labor filling in the crater in a rail line created nuclear explosion in the remote hills of eastern Czechoslovakia Specialist Cutler has come to the very clear realization that the life of regimentation and work he led as a light wheeled vehicle mechanic in the 36th Infantry Division in Germany wasn't so bad and that he possibly made a mistake deserting his unit in the chaos of the Battle of Ansbach.

The Soviet Victor I-class attack ssubmarine 60 Let Shefstva VLKSM continues its rampage against shipping in the eastern Atlantic, attacking the French-flag freighter Antilles as its en route to resupply the Dakar garrison. The Soviet sub puts a single 21-inch torpedo into the Antilles, inflicting fatal damage. The crew manages to radio a distress call before the ship slips beneath the waves, giving a reasonably accurate location and relaying that it was hit by a submarine-launched torpedo.

SOCCENT (Special Operations Command, Central) dispatches a trio of A-Teams from the 7th Special Forces Group into the area along the Soviet border with Iran, instructed to infiltrate into the Soviet rear area and assess the status of a number of facilities that the CENTCOM G-2 has identified as potentially being vital to Transcaucasian Front's war effort. The heavily-armed teams are dropped individually in the early morning hours; despite their impressive firepower the teams are ordered to avoid engagement, instead radioing in status reports of their assigned targets. CENTCOM will assign other assets - mostly 9th Air Force aircraft, but also including the USS Salem's and USS Cowpens' Tomahawk cruise missile batteries - to strike the targets if warranted.

[chico20854]

July 18, 1998

Nothin official for today. Unofficially,

North of Austin the Mexican 4th Army resumes its northward march, driven more by the need to capture additional food and fuel than any particular drive to continue the dwindling northward offensive. The lead elements of the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment almost immediately encounter outer pickets of the 95th Training Division's 2nd Battalion, 291st Infantry. The poorly trained and equipped American force gives ground almost immediately. (The American formation is composed of two platoons of draftees, each led by a single drill sergeant, with trainees who "show leadership potential" promoted to corporal and given command of squads. Ammunition is limited to one 30-round magazine per soldier, and the force has a single M-60 machinegun with 50 rounds as its sole support weapon). (One of the drill sergeants, wounded in the fighting for Dresden in 1996, has been unable to obtain his medications since early in the year, turning to drink as a substitute. He is lost in the retreat).

Another series of explosions rock the remote mountains of south-central Arizona as miners in Brigade Nogales destroy the two other paved roads that cross the remote Patagonia mountains. An entire company of Voluntarios is assigned to cover the main roadblock on Arizona Route 82; they begin emplacing general-purpose machineguns and 60mm mortars to cover the obstacle as well as preparing booby traps to embed in the pile of rubble blocking the highway.

Local Italian authorities succeed in resuming operation at the Sonico hydropower plant in the Alps north of Verona. The plant provides 73 megawatts of desperately needed electrical power, much of which is split between irrigation and industrial uses. Teams are working on reactivating five additional plants; engineers direct most of the power from the Sonico plant to these additional efforts.

A rescue effort is launched to rescue the crew of the torpedoed French freighter Antilles, which went down approximately 100 nm west of Lisbon, Portugal. The French Navy launches a pair of Atlantique maitime patrol aircraft - one carrying rescue equipment and another loaded with anti-submarine torpedoes and depth charges, while vectoring the patrol ship Cormoran and two French fishing boats to the area. The first aircraft drops a life raft and supplies to the ship's survivng crew, while the ASW aircraft sanitizes the area to ensure that the submarine does not attack the rescue force.

The situation at Thule Air Force Base in Greenland is rapidly deteriorating. The base's BMEWS early-warning radar was knocked out by a high-altitude Soviet nuclear strike back in April, but the blast inflicted only moderate damage on the airbase and the interceptors and tankers based there. The passage of time, and the presence of additional stranded aircrews and the ground crew and staff of the 119th Fighter Interceptor Squadron, 177th Fighter Interceptor Wing, have now led to dangerously low levels of supplies on the base, which normally receives an annual visit in July by a freigter and tanker loaded with the materiel and fuel that the base will need for the coming year. The situation in Norfolk, Virginia has prevented the ships' dispatch this year, and although additional supplies had been provided in July 1997 they are now running low. With the early warning radar out of commission and fuel supplies on the base dwindling, the commanding general makes the decision to evacuate most of the remaining personnel, leaving a caretaker detachment behind to try to keep the runway clear and provide a refuge for any friendly bombers or tankers that may be slated to recover to the remote northern base after future strikes on the USSR.

In the Smolensk area of western Russia, the 20th Guards Motor-Rifle Division, which was withdrawn to the area after taking heavy losses in the Battle of Germany and subsequent NATO invasion of Poland, is ordered to gather additional troops from its local area and convert to a cavalry division. In light of the dire situation at the front, the formation is to be ready for battle in 30 days according to the orders issued by STAVKA.